Royals' season ends after losses

Friday, July 24, 2015

The baseball season ended for the Mountain Home Royals over the weekend as they were eliminated from the Area B Class A American Legion Tourney at Wigle Field in Boise.

Earlier in the week, they split a pair of games with Canyon Ridge and lost two at Buhl.

Royals 4, Canyon Ridge 1

Royals 4, Canyon Ridge 16

(Five innings)

The Mountain Home Royals split a doubleheader with the Canyon Ridge Black Hawks last Monday at Royals Field in Mountain Home, winning the first game but dropping the nightcap in five innings

Curran Price pitched a complete game victory in the first game, scattering a fourth-inning single and a fifth inning single while striking out four and getting great defense behind him. Esmer Castillo had two hits while Bailey Miller-Hodge, Cody Simpson and Luke Lockard also had hits.

The Royals defense, which had just two harmless errors in the first game, had three in the first inning alone of the second game, as the Black Hawks jumped out to a 6-0 lead. Canyon Ridge used eight hits, five walks, six hit batters and five errors to put up 16 runs on the scoreboard in the nightcap.

The Royals managed just one infield hit by Luke Lockard in the nightcap as Canyon Ridge's Andreas Burton struck out eight batters.

Mountain Home Royals head coach and manager Mike Hobgood thought the first game effort clearly showed the type of ball his team is capable of playing.

"We jumped out to a pretty good lead, and Curran (Price) threw his tail off and we played great and played good defensively and didn't give them anything free," the coach said. "When we do that, I think we're capable of beating anybody.

"The second game just kind of had a Murphy's Law feel to it -- anything that could go wrong, did go wrong for us," the coach added. "I think sometimes we get happy with winning the first one and we come out in the second just kind of complacent and happy, and we don't really fight in the second one. We get down, and when we get down, we have a tendency to just kind of roll over and let them have it. I think that's a lot of our youth, but we will overcome that."

Tribe 9, Royals 7

Tribe 8, Royals 7

(Eight innings)

The Royals closed out their regular season schedule at Buhl on Thursday, dropping two close non-conference games to the Tribe. No further stats were available from the games.

"We battled them and came back in the first one and took them to extras in the second one," Coach Hobgood said. "We had an interference call at the plate that I didn't agree with that would have put us up a run in extras, and we would have won the game. But that team is going into their district tournament as the three seed, and we were right there with them and really had them on the ropes and gave them some free runs."

Boise Seminoles 10

Royals 0

(Five innings)

The Royals opened the Area B Class A District Tournament at Wigle Field in Boise on Saturday against the Boise Seminoles. The Royals, seeded ninth, lost to the eighth-seeded Seminoles in five innings.

The Seminoles jumped on Royals pitcher Curran Price for three runs in the first and second innings added another in the third inning and ended the game with three more in the fifth.

Mountain Home managed just three hits off Seminoles pitcher Riley Armstrong, who struck out 11 batters. Esmer Castillo had a double and Kyle Acarregui, and Curran Price also had hits for the Royals. Price suffered the loss, giving up 11 hits while walking three batters and hitting two.

The coach was disappointed in their outing against the Seminoles.

"I think we came out a little timid; a little flat," he said. "For a lot of these guys, it's the first time being at a district tournament at a high school-American Legion caliber. It is a step up, and I think some of us were a little scared and we definitely were flat, especially when they put that three-split up in the first. I think we kind of shied away a little bit."

The loss put the Royals in the consolation bracket, but Coach Hobgood believed the team could still come back.

"We'll get Borah, and they're beatable," he said. "We just have to do our job, and if we do, we can definitely rattle off four or five (wins) in a row. It's just a mental fortitude thing, your back's against the wall now, it's who wants it more."

Boise Senators 10

Royals 0

(Five innings)

The Royals faced the host Boise Senators in a loser-out game Sunday at Borah's Wigle Field and came up short in a five-inning shutout.

The game was close until the fourth inning with Mountain Home blowing scoring opportunities in both the second and third innings.

The Senators managed to push across one run in the second inning, and then in the fourth inning when the lead-off batter reached on an error. It opened the door for Boise to score seven unearned runs before the inning was over. The Senators managed to score two more runs in the fifth inning to end the game by the 10-run rule.

"I thought we really played with them until that fourth inning," Coach Hobgood said after the game. "We blew those scoring opportunities in the second and third innings that, had we been able to get some runs, might have changed the complexion of the game in our favor. But we're a young club, and when we don't take advantage of those opportunities, it can really come back to hurt us."

Tyler Abernathy and Esmer Castillo both had two hits for the Royals, Abernathy had a triple and Castillo doubled. Kyle Acarregui also had a hit. Cody Simpson suffered the loss, despite giving up just one earned run.

The loss ended the season for the Royals, who finished 10-33 overall.

Respond to this story

Posting a comment requires free registration: