Baseball teams remain in thick of GSL season

Perfection in baseball is elusive.

A player who gets a base hit 30 percent of the time is a success. Winning 60 percent of the time, sometimes even less, can mean a major-league playoff berth.

The Greater Spokane League is no exception, where one-third of the way into the GSL season, no team is unbeaten.

Nine teams, including all four Spokane Valley schools are in the thick of things.

Prior to Wednesday’s doubleheader at East Valley, University (5-1) was tied for first place with Ferris, a team the Titans lost to by a run Monday in a nonleague game.

West Valley (3-1) was not far behind prior to its doubleheader with Shadle Park.

East Valley (3-3) is right there, having split its season series with Central Valley and West Valley.

And, as Central Valley (4-4) will attest, not much separates teams in a league that already has produced five extra-inning games with 18 of the first 39 played decided by two or fewer runs.

Five of the Bears eight decisions have been by one or two runs. They lost 6-4 at Mead last week, then beat the Panthers 6-5 in 10 innings at home.

Tuesday, they lost twice at Mt. Spokane, including a 3-2 decision, their second straight extra-inning game.

It was a game that CV could have won, said coach Barry Poffenroth.

“There was no way we weren’t walking out of there without a split,” he said. “We just gave one away. We beat ourselves in the first game.”

Dane Knudson pitched seven strong innings of shutout baseball, but the score was 0-0 even after CV put six runners on base in the game’s first three innings and had the bases loaded in the third with only one out. Twice batters struck out looking.

In the eighth, Ryan Simmelink bunted for his third hit of the game, and Eric Peck pooched another bunt over the pitcher’s head for another single.

With one out and the bases loaded, Nick Lallier singled through shortstop for a 2-0 lead.

But Mt. Spokane came back with three runs in the bottom of the inning for the win and carried the momentum into a 7-1 game two win.

The one pitch Knudson wanted back was when he hit the leadoff batter in the inning.

“Dane did a great job,” said Poffenroth, “He had one bad pitch.”

Teammate Jake Swantko had two bad pitches, both for home runs that put the Wildcats up 3-0 after four innings.

“Jake didn’t pitch terrible,” said Poffenroth. “He’s coming around.”

The Knights got even with the Eagles in back-to-back games, completing an 11-8 win on Monday at WV following last Thursday’s 7-2 home loss.

Although outhit 14 to 8, a six-run fourth inning produced a 10-3 lead that held up. Tanner Hamilton had three hits including a double, two runs batted in and two scored for the Knights. Justin Tognocchi homered.

Justin Marlow had four hits in five at-bats for the Eagles, with a double and triple. Bryan Peterson homered.

U-Hi, which had beaten Mt. Spokane 1-0 on the road, lost its first game 4-2 despite three hits by losing pitcher Adam Smith. The Titans left 16 runners on base.

And that, in a nutshell, is why baseball is such an unpredictable game.

CV schools add slowpitch

Four years ago, when Spokane Public Schools added girls slowpitch softball to meet Title IX equity considerations, other districts in the Greater Spokane League expressed little desire to do the same.

Now the Central Valley School District has voted to join in.

Slow pitch will become an official GSL sport with a complete league schedule and count points toward the league’s annual all-sports trophy, said University activities coordinator Ken VanSickle.

VanSickle, who is the softball coordinator for the league, said it will mean more participation opportunities for girls, which will help with Title IX compliance that strives for the same percentage of boys and girls in athletics as there are in school.

Currently the fall league, which formed in 2002, includes five schools from Spokane Public Schools. Central Valley and University are in next year and the league could grow to as many as nine if Mead and Mt. Spokane also join.

“The Mead schools want to,” said VanSickle. “East Valley and Gonzaga Prep won’t.”

The plan is for a full league double round robin schedule, beginning in September and concluding by the end of October, he said.

•Fastpitch softball, a spring sport, is on school break and will return to action next week, including a couple of rainout makeups on Monday.

University (6-0), which shares first place, hosts Lewis and Clark in a game that was washed out last Friday. West Valley’s postponed game with Mt. Spokane has been rescheduled for April 17.

Central Valley (5-2) won its fifth straight, 12-0, over Ferris and is in fifth place in league. Winning pitcher Alyssa Erickson tossed a three-hitter and had three hits of her own, including a double.

Krista Osterwyk also had three hits, Stefani Siddoway and Ashley Mayhle had two hits each.

Now there is one

East Valley is the lone GSL soccer unbeaten, but things begin to heat up when the league returns to action next Wednesday.

The league-leading Knights (6-0) have matches to look forward to with North Central on April 15, at home against second-place Ferris (5-1) the following Monday and at Cheney two days after that.

Central Valley (5-1) dropped from the unbeaten ranks last Friday 2-1 at Mead in a shootout that took seven penalty kicks to decide.

The teams were scoreless until midway through the second period when Jay Vela scored off a Matt Bunch assist. The Panthers tied four minutes later, and the teams went through two overtimes without scoring again.

Both made four of five penalty shots during the first shootout phase before Mead prevailed for its second win in three shootouts this year.

The loss dropped the Bears into third place, a point behind Ferris.

East Valley, which got three goals from Ben Funkhouser in its 6-1 win over Clarkston, has 18 points, the Saxons 16 and Bears 15.

Six other teams, including Cheney, trail with between 13 and nine points. University (3-3) has 10.