Sierra Vista climbs out of hole

Nick Christensen

Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2005 | 9:24 a.m.

Heading into Saturday's American Legion regional tournament game, Sierra Vista pitcher Justin Mettelka didn't just have a good record, he had a dominant one.

Between the beginning of high school season in March and Saturday's game against Hawaii at Lied Field, Mettelka had a 5-2 record with 10 saves in 42 games. Batters had 53 hits and 22 runs off him in 76 1/3 innings, while Mettelka had allowed 25 walks and his defense had given up nine unearned runs.

So it seemed automatic when Sierra Vista coach Levi Gill inserted Mettelka in the eighth inning Saturday, leading Hawaii by three runs in the winner's bracket of the double-elimination tournament.

But Mettelka had one of his worst outings this year, giving up five hits, two walks and eight runs - all unearned -- in taking his third loss of the season.

As it turned out, it may have been his best night this season.

The loss put Mettelka and the Lions in the 8 p.m. semifinal Sunday, but the rains that soaked Henderson pushed back the start to Monday afternoon. That freed up Sierra Vista's Justin Garcia to pitch - American Legion rules restrict pitchers to 12 innings in 72 hours, and Garcia would have been limited on Sunday evening.

But Monday, Garcia was phenomenal, holding Merced to two hits in a nine-inning shutout. Scott Berke and Thomas Miller went 3-for-4 for Sierra Vista as it beat Merced 5-0 to advance to the title game, and Berke was a triple away from the cycle.

An hour later, the Lions were back on the field and facing a familiar foe - the kids from Hawaii who had just beaten them two days before. Starting for Kalani was Randy Kitagawa, 7-0 in Legion.

But the Lions were notably sharper, and it paid off. They gave up no errors Monday, and Kitagawa gave up nine hits as the Lions went into the eighth inning ahead 3-0.

Justin Baca had been pitching a stellar game, allowing two hits in 7 2/3 innings while striking out seven Hawaii batters.

Still, Gill went with his team's sandman late in the eighth, bringing in Mettelka to seal the deal.

Mettelka said Saturday was far from his mind when he left the bullpen.

"That's in the past. I just don't try to think about it," he said. "You just get yourself psyched up for today. We're just trying to go and win a championship tomorrow."

Still, Mettelka might have been seeing flashbacks in the ninth, when he gave up a leadoff double to Landon Nakata followed by an RBI triple to Marc Factora.

Fate stepped in to help a young man's confidence when Kasey Ko hit a long fly ball to left field, easily with the distance for Factora to score from third. But Factora fudged it and left early, and the Lions heeded the unified plea from the stands to "Throw to third!" for a unique double play. Joshua Markwith flied out to left to end the game and give Mettelka his 11th save of the year.

The Hawaii team seemed to play on Hawaii time - the team has scored in the eighth or ninth innings in every game of the tournament. But the players will need to have adjusted their body clocks today, as the final game of the regional tournament was slated to start at 8:30 this morning.

"Mettelka's a competitor," Gill said. "I know he really rises to the occasion when he has the opportunity to compete, so I'm sure there are jitters. But once he steps out on the mound he does an excellent job of focusing in on just competing and doing his job and trusting he has the defense behind him. It was really uncharacteristic the way we played the other day. It's going to happen but hopefully that's our one time for a long time."

The winner of this morning's game earned a berth in the American Legion World Series, which begins Thursday in Rapid City, S.D.

While Mettelka and the defense saved the day against the late-charging Hawaiians, it was Berke and the pitchers who set up Sierra Vista's winning afternoon.

Berke ended the day 5-for-8 with four runs and three RBIs. He had home runs in both games.

"He's a heck of a player," Gill said. "He hit the ball to the other side early and you know he's going to have a good day. He applies the pressure to the defense, to the pitcher and he really helps out the guy hitting behind him by doing that."

Berke was humble and put the focus more on the pitchers than on his afternoon.

"It was a solid day all around for the team and me," Berke said. "We've had confidence in our abilities, coming through the loser's bracket. Our pitching staff's carried us."

No doubt.

"Justin, Justin and Justin - you can't ask for anything more than what they're doing," Gill said of pitchers Garcia, Baca and Mettelka. "Five hits in two games, kept our defense in the game, kept us focused. It's just an awesome job and they've done it all year."

The total was seven hits, but who's counting?

Gill said he expected Drew Leary to start today's game. Leary is 3-2 with a 3.34 ERA in Legion ball, and was 7-0 with a 1.44 ERA in the high school season. He pitched a complete-game, five-hit shutout of Centennial when Sierra Vista won its first state baseball championship back in May.

Leary last pitched in Saturday's game against Hawaii, giving up five hits and two runs in seven innings.

"We're looking for some solid innings from him and then staff it behind him and have Mettelka, he's our man in the end," Gill said. "Drew's going to throw strikes, he's going to get ahead of batters, he keeps his walks down to a minimum, he keeps the defense into it and I have a positive outlook on tomorrow, definitely."