Yuma Catholic baseball falls short of state title
Yuma Catholic baseball falls to Valley Christian in the 3A state championship game
TEMPE, Ariz. (KYMA, KECY) - The Valley Christian Trojans defeated the Yuma Catholic Shamrocks 11-1 at Tempe Diablo Stadium in the AIA 3A state championship game on Monday.
Valley Christian wins the 3A state title.
The Trojans took a 3-0 in the second inning. In the third, Erik Topete drove in Daniel Ruiz to get the Shamrocks on the board. However, from then on out Yuma Catholic struggled to string together hits. Valley Christian's Will Bastian would walk it off in the fifth to end it 11-1 via mercy rule.
Yuma Catholic has zero seniors on their roster, so they will be returning their entire squad next season.
"Just because you get older, doesn't mean you get better," Yuma Catholic head coach Judd Thrower said. "We still have to get back to work."
He hopes that the feeling of falling one step short will fuel his team to take things to another level in the offseason.
"It's never easy to watch somebody celebrate and watch these guys celebrate as you're out in the field walking it off like that," Thrower said. "It's not something that should be a state championship game. So , I think that's not going to settle easy with these guys I'm sure. So I think part of that will help motivate them to ant to get back to here and finish the job."
