The Post 20 Twins saw their season end with a 1-0 loss to Service on Monday in the semifinals of the 71st Alaska Legion Baseball State Tournament at Mulcahy Stadium in Anchorage.
The No. 3 seed Twins (21-11-1) lost in the semifinals at state to the No. 2 Cougars (25-7) for the second straight season. Service will play the winner of the Monday night game between No. 5 Dimond (18-10) and two-time defending champ and top seed Eagle River (24-8).
Hunter Christian was the hero of the day for the Cougars.
Christian pitched a shutout, giving up just four hits while walking one and striking out seven. Two of the Twins hits came on misreads by center fielder Carson Maltby.
The Service righty threw 60 of his 90 pitches for strikes, including delivering first-pitch strikes to 17 of 26 batters. He held the Twins to 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position.
“He’s one of the best pitchers in the state and he was hitting his spots,” Twins coach Robb Quelland said of Christian. “We just were not comfortable at the plate against him.”
Christian also went 2 for 3 — the only batter to get two hits in the game — and had the game’s lone RBI. His one-out single scored Chase Mascelli from second base in the first inning.
“The competition is strong at this level at this time of the year,” Quelland said. “Runs are hard to come by and he put the ball in play and got a run in.”
Twins starter Malakai Olson nearly matched Christian pitch for pitch. He went all six innings and gave up a run on six hits while walking three and striking out three. Olson also hit a batter.
The Post 20 righty threw 44 of his 68 pitches for strikes and also delivered first-pitch strikes to 17 of 26 batters. The Cougars were just 1 for 7 with runners in scoring position.
Quelland also said Jayden Stuyvesant had a great game at catcher, showing how much he has grown this season.
“Our battery was phenomenal again today,” Quelland said. “We were errorless on defense.”
A couple sparkling plays on defense kept the game within reach for the Twins.
In the bottom of the fifth, the Cougars loaded the bases with one out. Christian took off his Superman’s cape for the only time all game by grounding into double play.
Braden Smith fielded the ball cleanly at shortstop and the turn was made by Gabe Smith, playing just his second game in the field since returning from an injury that kept him out for 12 months.
In the bottom of the sixth, Service had runners at second and third with one down. Kolby Jensen hit a fly ball to medium depth in right field and Atticus Gibson comfortably cut down Andrew Hickman at the plate.
“We had all the faith in the world in him,” Quelland said of Gibson. “We moved him to outfield for this game and he made us look like we know what we are doing.
“It was a phenomenal throw. It wasn’t even close.”
With the pitching and hitting clicking at such a high level, Quelland said the loss was even tougher.
“We were hitting on all cylinders, then one element of the game goes away and that was the difference in both games we lost in the tournament,” he said. “We could not generate runs when we had the opportunity.”
The closest the Twins got to tying the game was in the top of the fifth, when Derrick Jones doubled with one out on one of the misreads by Maltby.
The next batter up, Braden Smith, smashed a line drive ticketed for the outfield, but shortstop Macelli plucked the ball out of the air.
“I don’t know how he got it,” Quelland said. “It looked like he jumped 8 feet in the air.”
The Twins age out some serious firepower in Charlie Chamberlain, Jace Crall, Simon Grenier and Atticus Gibson.
At the same time, not one of those players threw a pitch for the Twins at the state tournament. The team allowed just 10 runs in four games.
The A, or junior varsity, for the Twins also currently has a 20-1 record.
“We’re already looking forward to three or four of those guys coming up next season and seeing what they can do for the program,” Quelland said.
But the coach isn’t thinking about next season yet.
“That final game was so heartbreaking,” he said. “The hundreds of hours and miles the kids and their families put in, and it’s over in the blink of an eye.”
Quelland thanked the community and the families for all the support this season.
