2A Baseball: Brit Lusk Fans 11 as Bearcats Blank Black Hills

SOLID PERFORMANCE: Brit Lusk Tossed an 11-Strikeout One-Hitter as W.F. West Shutout Black Hills, 5-0

Posted

Brit Lusk was absolutely dominant and his offense pushed across enough runs as the W.F. West Bearcats shutout the Black Hills Wolves 5-0 in a 2A Evergreen Conference finale in Olympia on Wednesday.

Lusk’s numbers are eye-popping to put it mildly. In 5.0 innings, he struck out 11 Wolves and allowed a single hit with just one walk. His FIP (fielding independent pitching), a stat that accounts for the lack of control of a pitch after its hit, was -0.700. A FIP simply below 3.00 is very good. Lusk’s was negative.

“Really solid pitching by Brit Lusk,” W.F. West coach Bryan Bullock said. “This was by far his best outing of the season.”

Gabe Smitherman was also effective, if not as dominant as his teammate. He tossed the final pair of innings, allowing no hits with a strikeout and a walk apiece.

Cade Haller scored two of WFW’s runs and added a hit and RBI. Drew Reynolds launched a dinger, and finished with two hits, two RBI and a run. Gavin Fugate and Brock Bunker accounted for the final two WFW runs. Andrew Stafford had an RBI and Lusk also doubled.

W.F. West (10-1) finishes out the regular season with a non-league tuneup for districts against Class 3A powerhouse Timberline on Friday. 

The Bearcats take the 2A EvCo’s No. 2 seed at districts after losing the tiebreaker to Tumwater. The Bearcats and Thunderbirds split their regular-season matchups but the T-Birds win the tiebreaker due to run differential. W.F West will host Black Hills in a loser-out game in the opening round of districts on Monday.

Rochester Rolls Past Shelton

The Rochester Warriors scored nine runs in the third and fourth innings on its way to a blowout home 10-2 win over the visiting Highclimbers in a 2A Evergreen Conference baseball game on Wednesday.

Eddie Burkhardt led the way offensively, notching two doubles and three RBI from the lower half of the order. Braden Hartley doubled, drove in three and scored a run, as well. Mason Ubias had two hits, both singles, and also scored a pair of runs. Tony Groninger had the third of three Rochester doubles, and also drove in and scored a run.



“The biggest thing for us was we got clutch base hits and we executed well in bunt situations,” Rochester coach Brad Quarnstrom said. 

Kyle Wilson was nails on the mound, allowing two runs (one earned) on seven hits with four strikeouts against three walks over 6.2 innings. Hyde Parrish put away the final out with no problems.

“Kyle had another great performance on the mound,” Quarnstrom said “He did a great job all night”

Rochester (6-7) completed its regular season and is the No. 4 seed heading into districts, where it will host Shelton on Monday.

Tigers Falter to T-Birds

Centralia’s bats went silent, notching just two hits while striking out 10 times in a 7-2 loss at home to Tumwater Wednesday.

Seniors Paris Chavez and Noah Aliff collected the Tigers’ only hits of the day, a double for Chavez and a triple for Aliff, as Centralia struggled to find a groove offensively against a Thunderbirds team that is the 2A Evergreen Conference’s No. 1 seed at the upcoming league playoffs.

Aliff went three innings on the mound, striking out one and allowing one earned run on six hits and a walk. Joey Unger fanned two while allowing three earned runs in 2.1 innings and freshman Landon Kaut struck out one in 1.2 scoreless innings.

Centralia falls to 8-5 overall and will open the league playoffs on Monday.