by Ben Murphy
Sports Writer
The Mattawan baseball team’s impressive run through the Division 1 post-season continues on. The Wildcats continued to stay hot in the post-season, including Saturday’s quarterfinal win over Traverse City West, 5-0 at Central Michigan University in Mt. Pleasant. This sends the team to the state semi-finals at Michigan State University today (Thursday) against Novi. Brownstown Woodhaven and Macomb Dakota play in the other semi-final, with the championship set for Saturday.
“I am really proud of what this group has done so far,” head coach Brett Vaughn said. “They have worked really hard all year to get to this point. Our hitting is really coming along the last few weeks. Our pitching has remained steady all year, and has even stepped up more as we have gone through the tournament.”
In the win over TC West, Brendan Garza got the win pitching, going five and one-third innings and giving up zero runs on two hits and six strikeouts.
On offense, Colin O’Reilly and Drew Atkinson led the way.
They reached the quarterfinals thanks to a 12-0 win over Cedar Springs in the regional championship earlier in the day.
Garza started the game and went three innings and gave up no runs on two hits and three strikeouts. Brendan Schultz went the final two innings and only gave up one hit.
On offense, the team had 11 hits, led by Garza, Connor Cole and Jaxon Engels.
On Wednesday, June 7 Mattawan won their regional semi-final game over Zeeland East, with a score of 6-3. This game was held at Portage Northern.
Garza got the win, going five and one-third innings and giving up one run on one hit. Kaden Jominy and Josh DeJong closed out the game on the mound.
On offense, Engels, Cole and Garza had two hits apiece and the Wildcats racked up 12 hits on the night.