CORVALLIS — With the team’s ace pitcher struggling on the mound and the lineup producing little offense, the Philomath High baseball team didn’t have much of a chance Wednesday at Class 5A Crescent Valley.
The Raiders (1-0) pounded out a dozen hits and got a complete-game one-hitter from senior Jacob Fritz in a 10-0 contest that was stopped with two outs in the bottom of the fifth inning on the mercy rule.
Gallery: PHS baseball at Crescent Valley (March 18, 2026)
A collection of photos from Philomath High’s baseball game at Crescent Valley on Wednesday.
Veteran coach Levi Webber talked to the team for several minutes following the game.
“Like I told them, it’s game one of 27 that we’ve got — we’ve got a long way to go,” he said.
Philomath (0-1) had just three base runners in the game. Junior Rustan Woosley hit a single to right field in the second inning and junior AJ Altishin and senior Wylie Griffith reached on walks.
Crescent Valley took a 1-0 lead in the first inning when junior Rylan Mosbrucker singled and later came around to score on an infield error. The Raiders erupted for four runs in the third inning with the biggest hit being a double to deep right-center by freshman Koa Wise. The inning served as an example of Crescent Valley taking advantage of its opportunities.
“I’m not going to say it was all bad luck but there was a little bit of bad luck,” Webber said. “I mean, Caleb (Babcock) made some good pitches and they beat some balls into the ground. The inning they scored four, we had some miscues that kind of led to those four runs.”
In the fourth, junior Cody Mitchell smacked a two-run double to the left-field fence for a 7-0 lead. The Raiders then ended the game in the fifth with three more runs — the last hit coming off the bat of Mitchell with the bases loaded.
Crescent Valley’s Fritz went the distance, facing 17 batters and throwing 71 pitches. He had at least one strikeout in every inning and ended up with nine for the game.
“The Fritz kid was playing well today,” Webber said. “It’s just learn and go get better and then we’ll be just fine.”
Philomath’s Babcock allowed six hits and no walks with four strikeouts in his three innings of work. Only one of the five runs scored against him was earned.
“I think he was trying to do a little bit too much out there and trying to overthrow a bit and falling behind in counts,” Webber said when asked to evaluate his team’s pitching. “When you fall behind in counts, especially against good teams, you force yourself to throw pitches that you don’t necessarily want to throw.”
Sophomore Jayce Iverson threw 1-2/3 innings and gave up six hits and five runs with two walks.
“Hopefully we learn and we grow and we get better from today,” Webber said. “We’ve just got to do a better job as a staff of working ahead and competing in the strike zone.”
Philomath will play its home opener against Gladstone on Friday. The first pitch is scheduled for 5 p.m. at Terry Stephenson Field.
Webber said a focus leading up to the game vs. the Gladiators will be on offense.
“The big thing is just competing at the plate,” Webber said. “We struck out nine times in five innings and if you do that, you make it real easy on a team — you’re essentially giving them three innings worth of outs.”
Webber said his team also needs to learn how to “play the game the right way.”
“I didn’t think we attacked the game the way that we should have or we normally do,” Webber explained. “Granted, it’s the first varsity game for a lot of these guys but catching them up to the speed and understanding the urgency that you need to play at this level is something that we’re going to have to work on.”
Gladstone opens its season Thursday against Astoria before making the trip to Philomath.
Crescent Valley 10, Philomath 0 (5)
Wednesday, March 18, at Tim Wirth Memorial Field
Crescent Valley HS, Corvallis
Team 1 2 3 4 5 R H E Philomath (0-1) 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 Crescent Valley (1-0) 1 0 4 2 3 10 12 0
Note: The game was stopped with two outs in the bottom of the fifth inning on the 10-run mercy rule.
Babcock, Iverson (4) and Herbert; Fritz and Wise. W — Fritz. L — Babcock. 2B — Mitchell.