12 area rowers compete in Victoria
VICTORIA — Sean Halberg and João Borges had the Olympic Peninsula Rowing Association’s best finish at the B.C. Championships on Elk Lake over the weekend.
Halberg and Borges placed third in the men’s masters double with a time of 3 minutes, 39.6 seconds.
That time was actually the second-best in the masters double — and only two-tenths of a second off the best time — but due to age handicap they placed third.
Borges is filling in as the Olympic Peninsula Rowing Association’s coach this summer while Rodrigo Rodrigues is serving as an assistant coach with the U.S. Junior National Team, which will compete at the World Junior Championships in Rio de Janeiro next month.
One member of the U.S. Junior National Team is Elise Beuke, who last year won a gold medal in the women’s JV double for the Olympic Peninsula Rowing Association member at the B.C. Championships.
The association sent three rowers to the regatta in 2014. Over the weekend, they had 12 competing.
Hannah Officer won her heat in the women’s junior A JV single and then placed sixth in the finals.
Tim Arnold, Alex Bryant, Gabe Wegener and Eric Prosser took fourth in their men’s junior JV quad heat.
Prosser and Wegener also were fifth in their heat in the men’s JV double.
In the women’s junior B quad, Olivia Bay, Maggie Van Dyken, Emily Bundy and Jessica Arnold took fifth in their heat.
Finally, Veronica Kennedy finished fifth her the women’s junior B single heat.
Rodrigues returned to the Pacific Northwest to attend the regatta. He has since returned to Connecticut to resume his coaching duties with the U.S. Junior Team.
Area team second
FERNDALE — North Olympic fell short in its bid to win the 12U Cal Ripken baseball state title with a 6-1 loss to the Whatcom Americans in the championship game Sunday.
The Port Angeles team was buoyed by the pitching of Wyatt Hall, Adam Watkins and Kamron Noard, who kept the game close for six innings.
But Whatcom had solid pitching of its own, limiting North Olympic’s offense to just three hits and one run.
North Olympic threatened in the second inning with one out when it scored a run and loaded the bases with the help of two walks and a hit batter, but Whatcom’s pitcher struck out the next two he faced to stall the rally.
Kamron Meadows, Jake Felton and Hall were all robbed of extra-base hits on potential hard-hit balls that were turned into outs by Whatcom’s defense.
Seth Woods led at the plate by going 1 for 1, while Hall had a double and Watkins a single to account for all of North Olympic’s hits.
North Olympic defeated Forks in the semifinal game 4-2.
Port Angeles took a 1-0 lead in the first on Watkins’ two-out RBI single that scored Hall.
Forks came back with two runs on a Trey Baysinger double in the third and held the lead into the fifth before Port Angeles’ comeback began.
Tanner Price reached on an error and was sacrificed to second by Dru Clark before a critical strikeout.
With two outs, Hall drew a walk, Noard singled to score Price as the tying run, and Felton delivered a two-run single to cap the scoring.
Watkins pitched two effective innings in relief to record the win on the mound.
Felton had a solid tournament at the plate, finishing with a .500 batting average. Woods hit .467, Hall .444 and Landon Seibel .428.
Also contributing in limited action were Michael Soule and Eli Cyr, who each hit .500, and Logan Beebe, who hit a perfect 1.000.
PA 10U All-Stars
MOSES LAKE — The Port Angeles 10U All-Star team struggled at the state tournament and in the heat earlier this month, losing all four of its pool play games.
Two of the losses came in the final inning.
Zane Glassock, Thor Olsen and John Vaara had standout individual hitting performances for Port Angeles.
Glassock pitched a complete game against Bellingham in 102-degree heat, only to lose in the last inning 4-3 on an error.
Elijah Flodstrom was 8 for 16 from the plate in the tournament.
In the bracket portion of the tournament, the bats finally came alive for Port Angeles in an 11-9 win over Wenatchee.
Wenatchee took an early 7-1 lead, but the tide turned as the team rallied for Thor Olsen, who was knocked out of the game by a collision with a Wenatchee player on a race to first base.
Port Angeles pitchers Vaara and Kolten Corey shut down Wenatchee over the last four innings.
Port Angeles kept chipping away at the lead with key hits from Myles Bowechop, Eliljah Flodstrom and Glassock.
Coming off the mound in the fifth inning, Vaara had a stint of heat stroke but gutted out a hit in his at-bat to drive in the go-ahead runs.
“It was a great team win to keep battling and not get down,” coach Eric Flodstrom said.
The win set Port Angeles up to face the No. 1 seed in the tournament, Ferndale, which 10-runned every team it faced in pool play.
Solid pitching by Kellen Garcelon and Flodstrom kept Port Angeles in the game.
A triple by Corey, a home run from Elisha Howard, along with three hits by Vaara and two from Bowechop, helped Port Angeles stay in the game until the end, but Ferndale ended up winning 11-6.
“With all of the 10U players getting their first taste of state tournament play, the team showed a lot of potential,” Eric Flodstrom said.
