Following a one-out double over the left fielder’s head in the bottom of the first inning, senior Mason Stearns stood on second base, made a playful gesture toward his teammates in the dugout and flashed a big smile.
The next batter, junior Kayson Olsen, pulled off the same feat with a double over the center fielder’s head. Just like that, the Warriors led 1-0 and would not let up the rest of the way in a 12-1 mercy-rule victory Monday over Sweet Home.
It’s fun hitting the ball well. And it’s fun winning.
Gallery: PHS baseball vs. Sweet Home (April 8, 2024)
A collection of photos from Philomath High’s 12-1 baseball win over Sweet Home at Terry Stephenson Field on Monday.
“We started meshing when we went over to Madras,” Stearns said, referring to a 13-0 win on April 2. “Everybody just started having fun in the dugout, everyone’s having a good time being friends, just playing together as a team and really coming together in these last four or five games.”
The team had struggled through a 1-4 start to the season but then pulled out a close one over Crook County, 6-5. The next day, the Warriors rolled to that shutout over Madras. A doubleheader sweep over La Grande this past weekend and the win over Sweet Home extended Philomath’s win streak to five games.
Philomath (6-4 overall, 1-0 Oregon West) will face Sweet Home (2-8, 0-1) two more times this week — Wednesday on the road and Thursday back at home. The Warriors appear on paper to be the better team but as such, PHS coach Levi Webber stresses to his players the importance of playing to a standard while leaving emotions out of it. In other words, don’t play down to the opponent.
“When you see a team that hasn’t had a ton of success like Sweet Home, you worry about that a little bit,” Webber said. “But I thought today our guys came out and focused on themselves and how we play the game and were not worried about how the opponent was playing. They just came out and competed really hard.”
The team’s hitting has taken a step forward during the winning streak and was on full display against the Huskies. Seven of the nine starters had at least one hit. Five of Philomath’s 10 hits were doubles.
“I think the approach has just changed over the last four games,” said Stearns, who went 3 for 4 with three RBIs. “Coach Webb’s (Webber) been really harping on us to change the approach, especially when we can get on top of one like we could with all of those pitchers today.”
Webber saw hints of the team starting to turn the corner on offense in the one-run win over Crook County.
“I think that was a big confidence boost because they had a couple of pretty good arms and we handled them pretty well and put a bunch of good at-bats together throughout the game,” Webber said. “Then we went over to Madras and strung a bunch of more good at-bats together and started barreling some balls up and then we went to La Grande and did the same thing.”
Webber said PHS hitters have been more disciplined.
“We’re making sure that we’re getting good pitches that we can hit … and we’ve also been extremely good with two strikes — a lot of two-strike knocks and not a lot of strikeouts,” Webber said. “When you do that and you get guys on base, good things are going to happen for you.”
Stearns went the full five innings at pitcher and allowed five hits and one walk with three strikeouts. He had a mixed reaction with how his game went on the mound.
“That was a pretty good outing for me,” he said while mentioning his best performance a week earlier. “The defense played better than I pitched though.”
Said Webber, “Mason did a great job of throwing a ton of strikes and found his way out of jams … and our guys played good defense behind him.”
Philomath went up 4-0 in the second inning. Junior Grant Niemann led off with a double and later scored on a ground out by sophomore Rocco De La Rosa. Stearns hit a two-out, one-run single and junior Logan Matthews scored when Sweet Home’s pitcher made an error on a pickoff attempt at first.
Philomath put the game out of reach with a six-run third inning. Stearns and sophomore Caleb Babcock highlighted the hitting attack with two-run singles. Niemann scored on a wild pitch and De La Rosa drove one in.
In the fourth, Matthews drove in sophomore Wylie Griffith, who led off the inning with a double, on a sacrifice fly to deep center. Olsen later had his second double of the game and drove in the team’s final run.
In the top of the fifth, Sweet Home went down 1-2-3 and the game ended on the 10-run rule.
