West Seattle High School has made it to the championship game to be played Saturday May 25, at 4pm in Gesa Stadium in Pasco, WA. They defeated Mt. Si 3-1 on Friday May 24
This morning in Southeast Washington the fur flew when the Wildcats of West Seattle defeated the Mount Si Wildcats 3-1 and advance to the final game of the WIAA 3A State Baseball championship.
West Seattle has never advanced this far in team history. They did it today on the strong pitching arm of senior Sam Hellinger and freshman shortstop Morgan McCullough’s standout defense. Hellinger is a member of the Seattle Times All Area Team for 2013 and McCulluogh is the 2013 recipient of the Josh Dickerson Inspirational Award.
West Seattle struck first when in the top of the first Spencer Elder was advanced to second base on a baulk. That brought up Sam Hellinger who took a first pitch deep to right field for a stand up double. Elder was held on third and the Wildcats and runners in scoring position. Next batter up was Tim Adams who took a 2-0 pitch just past the second baseman for an RBI single and West Seattle jumped out to 2-0 lead and would never look back.
The score would remain 2-0 until the top of the fifth when leadoff hitter Morgan McCulluogh blasted a double bagger. Spencer Elder hit a deep dribbler up the first base line that forced the Mt Si pitcher to take the easy out at first allowing McCullough to stand up at third. Hellinger was next at the plate. He hit the ball sharply towards first base and again forcing the play at first allowed McCulluogh to score and that was all that West Seattle needed.
Mount Si threatened in the bottom of the seventh when Hollinger’s throw to first base went wide and allowed a Mount Si runner to score but that would be all the runs the other Wildcats would muster.
Hellinger went the distance on the mound using his pitches effectively allowing six hits, one run, and four K’s. Surprisingly neither pitcher had a walk in the game.
The Wildcats will face Auburn Mountain View (who defeated Kennewick 6-4 in the afternoon game) tomorrow at 4 pm for all of the marbles.
It was looking like West Seattle was going to face Kennewick, leading Auburn 3-1 in the bottom of the sixth AMV exploded with a five run inning and held on to win 6-4.
In an odd sports note the morning game was between two teams with “Wildcats” as their moniker and the afternoon game was between two “Lions” teams.
You can view an on demand video of the game through the PlayOnSports website here:
http://www.playonsports.com/channels/participant-88825/events/61670
