Host C-M planning to make an impact

Spencer Patterson

Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2002 | 9:30 a.m.

The Cimarron-Memorial Spartans have a chip on their shoulder heading into this week's American Legion Western Tournament, and their coach is hoping that might be just the thing to propel them to a World Series berth.

Because Southern Nevada will host this week's eight-team regional, two local teams will join one each from Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, New Mexico and Utah. State champion Centennial will be joined by Cimarron, which finished second during the regular season.

And that, Spartans coach Kevin Kohler said, has led to talk he believes his players can use as additional motivation.

"A lot of people are saying we backed in, and they're taking it personally," Kohler said. "The way we ended up in state was not the way we wanted to go out. We feel like we have something to prove at regionals."

Cimarron (39-9) will open play Thursday against Helper (Utah) at 5 p.m. at the Community College of Southern Nevada. Woodland Hills (Calif.) and Mid Pacific (Hawaii) are also in the Spartans' half of the bracket.

The Spartans finished just one game behind Centennial during the regular season before going 1-2 in last week's state tournament. With five veteran pitchers -- Matt Wagner, Jared Johnson, Allan Woodward, Garrett Kohler and Paul Schmidt -- who are a combined 34-5, Cimarron could be a factor this weekend.

"We feel like we have the pitching to get us through this format," Kohler said. "And the biggest thing is these kids have sort of dreaded this last game together for three years. The goal is to win the last game."

Centennial (35-8) comes in as both the regular-season champion and the state champion. The Bulldogs begin regional play Thursday against Albuquerque after the Cimarron-Helper game. Boulder (Colo.) and Tucson (Ariz.) will also play in Centennial's portion of the draw.

"Once we knew we finished No. 1 in town, we talked about making a good showing in state and earning it," Bulldogs coach Kirk Primas said. "All week our focus was on state, but half an hour after beating Reno that was over and our focus was on regionals."

The top two teams in each side of the bracket will advance to Saturday's semifinals, with Sunday's championship game slated for 7 p.m. The winner will move on to this year's Legion World Series in Danville, Va.

Bishop Gorman was the last area team to earn a World Series berth, in 1998 -- the last time it was held in Las Vegas.