SIERRA VISTA — Two games involving three Southern Arizona teams in the state Little League baseball playoffs took place simultaneously within a few feet of each other Sunday morning at Sierra Vista’s Stone Complex.
Canyon View of District 5 lost to High Desert 13-3 in five innings in the winners bracket final while Rincon of District 12 beat District 8’s Nogales 1-0 in an elimination-bracket game that was a pitcher’s duel involving Rincon’s Caleb King and Nogales’ Isaac Aguilar.
Rincon will play Litchfield Park in an elimination-bracket semifinal game Monday at 6 p.m. at the Stone Complex.
Canyon View, which had its seven-game winning streak in the district and state tournaments snapped in the loss to High Desert, will play the winner of the Rincon-Litchfield Park game Tuesday at 6 p.m.
High Desert awaits the team from the elimination bracket in the championship round that is Wednesday at 6 p.m. Whoever High Desert faces — Rincon, Litchfield Park or Canyon View — must beat it twice Wednesday night to advance to the West Regionals next week at San Bernardino, Calif.
High Desert tallied 13 hits off four Canyon View pitchers in the game that ended by mercy rule.
Zack Miller belted two home runs and Bentley Pater added another one for High Desert.
“That was a very good High Desert team and we didn’t play our best,” Canyon View manager Jeff Casper said. “If you don’t play your best against a good team, you’re going to get punched in the mouth. That’s exactly what happened.
“We’ll come back. What I just told the guys is there are 14 districts that started this tournament. There were well over 100 teams that started this thing back in June. When we show back in Sierra Vista (on Tuesday), there will be three teams left. We’ve got to to have that mindset that we still have a chance in this tournament. We’ll be back ready to go on Tuesday.”
Canyon View manager Jeff Casper talks about his team having to rebound after a 13-3 loss to High Desert in the state Little League tournament winners bracket final. CV plays Tuesday at 6 p.m. in the elimination-bracket final at Sierra Vista. Casper, a Salpointe grad who played… pic.twitter.com/RZLE86LeY6
— Javier Morales (@JavierJMorales) July 21, 2024
Canyon View’s Grayson Dorland had an RBI single to lead his team Sunday.
Austin Reddick and Diego Moyers each had a hit and run.
The team includes Walker and Will Duncan, twin sons of former Canyon del Oro and Arizona standout Shelley Duncan, who played in the major leagues for seven seasons.
Casper was a teammate of Shelley Duncan’s when they played together at Arizona from 1999 to 2001. Jerry Stitt was their coach. Casper later served as a graduate assistant and full-time assistant under Andy Lopez at Arizona.
Of his relationship with Stitt and Lopez, Casper said: “Both of them were mentors to me, for sure.”
“I enjoyed playing for Coach Stitt. Coach Lopez has been amazing. People around Coach Lopez see me coach these Little Leaguers and hear a lot of the same things that he used to say. He is a big part of everything I do. I think a lot of what he says throughout my business life and coaching. He is certainly an important part of my life.”
Rincon is in the elimination bracket after losing 7-6 to Canyon View on Saturday.
Rincon manager Braden King made the decision to start his son Caleb on the mound for the first time this summer and it paid off in the win over Nogales. The elder King generally calls the pitches, but he relinquished that responsibility to assistant Jon Bennett because he said he steps aside when his son pitches.
Rincon manager Braden King decided to go with son Caleb on the mound in the elimination-bracket game against Nogales of the state Little League tournament. Caleb came through in his first start of the summer with a complete-game shutout, a 1-0 win to keep Rincon’s season alive. pic.twitter.com/DorNP3t1uB
— Javier Morales (@JavierJMorales) July 21, 2024
“Jon did a nice job of calling the game; he was telling me that (Caleb) was hitting every spot,” Braden King said. “He hit his spots all day long and made them look off-balance. That’s what we wanted.”
The elder King also mentioned that his son was a “nervous wreck” upon learning Saturday that he will start against Nogales.
The younger King channeled that nervous energy into the best performance of his young baseball career.
He scattered three hits and did not allow a walk. He finished with two strikeouts and , throwing 52 strikes out of his 63 pitches in the game.
“It was a nervous game — win or go home — and it was a good team,” Caleb King said. “Nogales, I have a lot of respect for them. I thought their pitcher (Aguilar) dominated. But I feel like I was very confident. I played pretty well so it felt good.”
Aguilar allowed six hits in his six innings of work. He struck out eight and walked one.
The lone run scored was unearned against him.
Rincon 3B Dom Hainley fielded some hard-hit grounders to back up starter Caleb King strongly and he had what proved to be the game-winning RBI in the fifth in his team’s 1-0 win over Nogales. Rincon advances in the elimination bracket of the state Little League playoffs with the… pic.twitter.com/UfdZa2WYJN
— Javier Morales (@JavierJMorales) July 21, 2024
After Easton Watson singled with one out in the fifth, he stole second base and advanced to third on a throwing error. Dom Hainley followed with a single to left field, scoring Watson. Aguilar got the next two batters to fly out and ground out.
The 1-0 lead held because of Caleb King’s performance and Rincon’s impeccable defense that did not commit an error.
Hainley gloved a couple of hard-hit grounders at third base and Hudson Haner made a diving stop of a line drive in the sixth inning.
“I was just thinking, ‘Get the ball in play. Get it to the outfield.’ And I did that,” Hainley said of his game-winning RBI in the fifth inning.
Of Caleb King’s performance, Hainley said, “It gave us a lot of confidence. He was getting them to hit a bunch of groundballs.”
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator in 2016 and is presently a special education teacher at Sunnyside High School in the Sunnyside Unified School District.
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