BAYFIELD
Zane Phelps finished the game on the mound, and he hoped to finish the game at the plate, too. His buddy Matthew Knickerbocker beat him to the final punch.
With Phelps standing in the on-deck circle, Knickerbocker hit a hard single through the right side of the Montezuma-Cortez infield and into right field in the bottom of the fifth inning on Tuesday at Bayfield High School. Standing on second base, Anthony Chamblee was heading for home as soon as the ball left Knickerbocker’s bat. When Chamblee crossed the plate, the game was over, as Bayfield High School claimed a 13-3 mercy-rule win in five innings against the Panthers.
“I was pretty antcy hoping it was going to be me, but (Knickerbocker) did it,” Phelps said of the walk-off hit. “It doesn’t matter who did it, we’re here to win. We expect to win.”
Winning is all the Wolverines (12-2, 4-0 Class 3A Intermountain League) have done lately. Tuesday’s victory made it 10 in a row dating back to March 24.
“We prepare for every game the same; we treat it like it is the state championship,” said Chamblee, son of Aaron and Jennifer Chamblee.
Chamblee set the tone for the Wolverines four times Tuesday. The senior leadoff hitter led off the first, second, fourth and fifth innings, reaching safely every time and coming around to score a run all four times. He was 2-for-2 at the plate with a single and a double to go with two walks.
“My job is getting on base and letting these guys hit me in. We all did our job, really,” Chamblee said. “We call ourselves the ‘Bomb Squad,’ and we like to hit the ball.”
BHS drew five consecutive walks to open the game against Montezuma-Cortez starting pitcher Andrew Laymon. After two runs walked in, Taed Heydinger ripped a two-run single and came around to score on a double by Noah Loutherback, who also had a sacrifice fly to drive in a run in the game.
Chamblee doubled to lead off the second inning, and two Montezuma-Cortez (6-10, 0-7 Class 4A Southwestern League) errors in the inning allowed him and Knickerbocker both to score to push BHS’ lead to 7-1 after two innings.
Junior pitcher Brody McGhehey started the game on the mound for the Wolverines and earned the win despite struggling a bit with command. He allowed five hits, hit three batters and walked one. He struck out one and was charged with two of the three runs that crossed the plate on his watch.
“That’s how we’ve been hurt this year, is walking guys. We gotta cut that out pretty quickly,” BHS head coach Jonathon Qualls said. “Brody got down on himself, but he did fine outside of one bad inning.”
Phelps came on and finished the final 1 2/3 innings. He didn’t allow a hit but walked two and plunked one batter with a pitch.
At the plate, BHS added five runs in the fourth inning thanks to Phelps’ two-run single, an RBI-single by Dillon Hoselton, one Montezuma-Cortez error and Loutherback’s sacrifice fly.
“One through nine, we’re pretty stout. This is the best team I’ve ever been apart of, honestly,” said Phelps, son of Dion and Koel Phelps. “It’s cool to see any guy can go off the wall, hit one out or hit a hard line drive.”
Chamblee, Phelps and Qualls all said it feels good to beat a Class 4A team so decisively. The Wolverines jumped up to No. 3 in the Associated Press rankings Tuesday behind only Eaton (10-0) and Lamar (12-1), and they hope to keep climbing with five games to go in the regular season.
They’ll get another chance to beat a 4A squad at home Tuesday against Durango.
“We’re looking forward to that; it should be a good game,” Qualls said of the Durango game. “We’ve had a few 4A schools this year, and it’s fun to play the bigger schools and show you can play with them.”
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
