Tigers beat Bulldogs before sweep by Skyview

The Mountain Home Tigers went 1-2 last week in conference baseball, beating Nampa in a makeup game before losing two to Skyview.

Tigers 12, Nampa 4

The Mountain Home Tigers came away from Nampa last Tuesday with a 12-4 win over the Bulldogs to complete a game started on March 16. The earlier contest was suspended in the third inning due to rain with Mountain Home up, 7-4.

The Tigers, who scored seven runs in the second inning back in March, added four in the fourth and a single run in the seventh.

Tiger head baseball coach Mark Cotton was glad to see his squad bounce back from their showing at the spring classic.

"A big difference from this weekend," he said. "Our base running was better, defense was solid and Jared came out and really threw the ball well and worked ahead. You couldn't really ask for anything more."

While the team jumped out quick, Cotton added that the team went flat at the end.

"I would have liked to see us finish strong as well, but we'll take it," he said. "It was a great win, but we've got two tough games coming up this week."

Danny Brescia, Austin Bodily, Gage Curtis and Joe Gutierrez each had two hits for the Tigers. Bodily and Gutierrez both had two RBIs with Bodily hitting a triple, Brescia driving in a run and Curtis adding a double. Jake Hennessey had an RBI-triple, Skyler Podesek had an RBI-single and Alex Burke and John Kennison also had hits.

Jared Day went the distance, striking out 13 batters to improve to 3-1 on the season.

Skyview 11, Mountain Home 6

Mountain Home pitchers walked seven Skyview batters Thursday with five of them scoring in an 11-6 conference win by the Hawks at Mountain Home.

Skyview score four runs in the first and second innings, and the Tigers answered with three in those two to make it 8-6, Hawks, after two. Skyview got two more in the third and another in the sixth for the win.

"The thing that was the most disappointing about the whole day was the fact that I felt we definitely could have hung with that team," Coach Cotton said after the game. "I felt like we were just as good as those guys, but we just did not come out to play today. We gave them way too many opportunities. We walked way too many batters, and we had a chance to make some routine plays to get out of an inning. We weren't able to do it.

The Tigers also make some huge base-running mistakes that hurt the team, the coach added.

"A lot of things kind of piled on today that showed our inconsistencies, so we've got to get more consistent with executing and the basic fundamentals of the game," he added

Skyler Podesek had a triple and drove in two runs for the Tigers. Danny Brescia, Jake Hennessey, Alex Burke and Joe Gutierrez also had hits with Gage Curtis adding an RBI.

The Tigers got a good relief effort by Zach Peterson, who pitched over four innings of one-run ball. Alex Rodriguez suffered the loss to fall to 2-3 on the season.

Skyview 11, Mountain Home 0

(Five innings)

The Tigers batters were held to just one hit Friday at Skyview as the Hawks blanked Mountain Home, 11-0, in five innings.

Danny Brescia had Mountain Home's only hit off Skyview lefty Casey Bennett, who struck out seven batters, though the Tigers did have base runners on in every inning but the fifth. Gage Curtis took the loss, falling to 0-1.

Despite the lopsided loss, Coach Cotton thought his Tigers played better than they had the night before.

"I don't want to make excuses, but I think what it comes down to there were some opportunities to make plays and we didn't," he said. "We made more plays than we made last night, so there are some positives there. But ultimately, they came out and they put on a 'clinic' at the plate. They hit the ball well.

While Curtis threw really well during the contest, the Hawks came ready to play, the coach said.

"Skyview played a great game, and their pitcher kept us off balance all day," he added. "Overall, I thought our effort was better than yesterday's, even though the score might not indicate that."

With the Tigers midway through their season, Cotton said his team needs a gut check knowing they have a lot of baseball to play.

"(Are) we going to progress and get better, or are we just going to kind of fade," the coach asked. "I think this is a real key moment in the season in the next two weeks to kind of see what we're made of."

The loss dropped the Tigers to 5-3 in conference and 5-7 overall.

Mountain Home hosted Jerome for two non-conference games on Tuesday and host Bishop Kelly Thursday, April 12, before they face the Knights at Bishop Kelly on Friday.