VVHS got their bats going in the 4th inning to score and seal a first-round win in Regionals. (Photo: Damon Jackson)

Virgin Valley High School, Mesquite, NV-

The VVHS Bulldogs Baseball Team started their tournament play today at 4:00 pm PST, beating Western Warriors in the first round of the NIAA 3A Southern Region Playoffs. The #1 Desert Seed started off against the #8 seed of Western for the first couple of innings by taking a small lead. However, they got their bats swinging during the 4th inning to take a monstrous offensive wave rolling to smash the hopes of the Warriors moving on in the tournament. The Bulldogs won 13-3.

The Western Warriors came right in and began the top of the 1st inning by scoring right away and going up 1-0. The Bulldogs fought back in the bottom of the 1st inning to score 4 and then the Warriors replied with a score of one in the top of the second to be down by 2. With the score being 4-2, heading into the 4th inning, the game was closer than expected.

“Western came to play today,” said Assistant Coach Nick Montoya. “They are playing tough.”

Then came the bottom of the fourth inning.

Bats started cracking away by the Bulldogs as Kyler Sudweeks nailed a deep ball to the center field that dropped just before the fence, scoring three runs while recording a triple and off an error, Sudweeks scored as well. That lead to 4 of the 8 runs scored in the bottom of the 4th inning.

With heading into the top of the 5th inning up by 10 runs, 12-2, the Bulldogs looked to hold off Western from scoring to end the game early by a mercy rule. However, Western rallied to score one run and cut the lead down to 9.

Bulldogs knew they needed to score one run to end the game and they did just that as they knocked several base hits to score the winning run and end the game, 13-3.

Kurt Felix offensively was on fire with a 1.00 batting average and 3 for 3 and 2 doubles. Kyler Sudweeks was 3 for 4 hitting in 3 RBIs and scoring 2 runs. Felix also scored 3 runs.

Defensively, the team was nearly perfect with a .958 fielding percentage. Jared Jensen pitched 3 innings with 2 strikeouts, allowing 5 hits and 2 scores and claiming the win. Martin Jordan finished the game pitching 2 innings with 1 strikeout. The majority of defense was the infield and outfield players who recorded 23 out of 24 total chances of plays into outs. Only 1 error away from a perfect defensive stand.

The team now moves onto the second round where they will play Tuesday, May 10th at Virgin Valley High School starting at 4:00 pm. They will be playing Pahrump Valley High School which is the #2 seed of the Mountain League. Pahrump Trojans beat Clark High School 8-1. Pahrump is the team who handed the Bulldogs their worst loss of the season on March 25th, by a score of 11-0.

This time around the Bulldogs are on home field with their fans in the stands and running off an 11-game win streak. No matter what it will be a challenging game as the Trojans sit at 20-8 for the season and 8-2 in league play. The Bulldogs are 20-5 for the season and 10-0 for league play.

Other games in the Southern Regional Playoffs results came in tonight. Moapa Valley beat Eldorado 4-0, Boulder City beat SLAM Nevada 10-0. Moapa Valley will play at Boulder City tomorrow at 4:00 pm.

Meanwhile in the Consolation Bracket Western will play at Clark and SLAM Nevada will play at Eldorado. The winners of these games will go on to play the losers of the winner’s brackets second-round games.

All games mentioned above are being played tomorrow at 4:00 pm. Again, the Bulldogs continue on in the winner’s side of the Regional Playoff bracket against Pahrump Valley at 4:00 pm PST. The game will be played at VVHS Baseball Field located at 820 Valley View Drive.