Two area teams compete in Legion tourney

Nick Christensen

Wednesday, Aug. 10, 2005 | 10:04 a.m.

Western Regional

Lied Field at CCSN, Henderson Thursday's Games

9 a.m. -- Merced (Calif.) vs. Albuquerque

Followed by: Tucson vs. Niwot (Colo.)

5 p.m. -- Las Vegas Hawks (Silverado) vs. Honolulu

Followed by: St. George (Utah) vs. Las Vegas Lions (Sierra Vista)

Three months ago, Sierra Vista baseball was on top of the world.

The Mountain Lions swept through the Sunset Regional and Nevada state tournaments and ended the school year ranked 19th in the country by USA Today.

The fun for Sierra Vista carried into June, when the Mountain Lions won their first nine games of the American Legion season, and were 16-6 overall in June games.

That strong start to the Legion year, followed by a 20-4 July record, locked in one of the state's two berths in this week's Western Regional tournament at CCSN in Henderson.

That's good news for the Lions, because they've been playing anything but their best baseball lately. They've lost four of their past six games, including an 11-3 defeat to Bishop Gorman in the state tournament that eliminated them from contention for the state title.

Levi Gill, who coaches Sierra Vista's summer team, said Tuesday that his team is working on overcoming its late-season slump.

"The focus should still be there. We've spent the last two days talking quite a bit about that," he said. "I don't know if it's burnout. I would hope not now. Now, I think this regional is something they haven't ever been to before and I think it would be a nice notch on their belt, a goal of ours since the beginning of the year."

But the team that cruised to the state title in May is missing two key components. All-State pitcher Chad Riddle isn't with the team this summer, and third baseman Chris Carter is at Single-A Bristol (Va.), batting .290 with 23 RBIs in 162 at-bats.

The biggest loss, though, has been Riddle, who had a 10-2 record with a 1.31 ERA in the high school season. Plus, the Lions have had to play nine-inning games all summer, further testing what was nearly infallible pitching in the seven-inning high school games.

"We try to spread around the starts," Gill said. "Justin Baca is throwing the ball very well, Justin Garcia's throwing the ball very well. Our two lefties got knocked around but they're still confident and we still have confidence in them."

Silverado, playing as the Las Vegas Hawks, won the Nevada title last weekend and also clinched a berth in this week's regional. The winner of the eight-team regional advances to the American Legion World Series, which starts next week in Rapid City, S.D.

It's the Hawks' first trip to the regional tournament since 1999, which is also the last year that Southern Nevada hosted the Legion regional. That year, the Hawks lost to Chatsworth (Calif.), consistently one of the top programs in the country.

But that year, the format was a round-robin format. This year, the format switches to double-elimination, with the championship game - or games, if necessary - slated for Monday night.

"Right now we're just looking forward to the opportunity to get in this thing," Hawks coach Brian Whitaker said. "Hopefully, we'll come out and play like we can. If we do that, we'll be tough to beat."

Whitaker said the most fun part about this week is managing to his team's strengths, with the uncertainty surrounding opponents keeping him from worrying about their potential weaknesses.

"I'm looking forward to the unknown," he said. "It's neat to play teams we've never seen and it's a lot different from last week, where we all kind of knew each other. That part's intriguing."

Both Silverado and Sierra Vista's teams play in the second session of Thursday's opening round of the tournament. Those games begin at 5 p.m. at Lied Field at CCSN in Henderson.