Regular season or postseason.<\/p>\n
It really doesn\u2019t matter to Kentlake\u2019s Zach Wright and Miles Nagel.<\/p>\n
No matter the time of year, the Falcons\u2019 unflappable duo is going to produce. And they did just that last Saturday afternoon at Kent Memorial Park, leading the Falcons past Beamer in a Class 4A West Central District baseball game, 16-6.<\/p>\n
The sophomore Wright delivered five strong innings on the mound, allowing one run on six hits and striking out four. Nagel, a junior, came through with the bat, going 3 for 4 with a pair of long doubles, two RBIs and two runs scored.<\/p>\n
\u201cMe and him are like the calmest people on the team,\u201d said Nagel, Kentlake\u2019s hot-swinging designated hitter. \u201cWe just stick to our own business.\u201d<\/p>\n
And on Saturday, that business meant earning a state berth, which the Falcons accomplished for the first time since 2005 and just the second time in school history.<\/p>\n
Kentlake did it behind an explosive offensive performance and the usual steady pitching of Wright, who just a week earlier, helped the Falcons beat Puyallup, 4-3, for the South Puget Sound League title.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like pitching the big games,\u201d said Wright, who needed just 72 pitches to work through five innings and also rang up a solo home run in the fourth inning. \u201cI\u2019ve just been doing it for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the win, the Falcons (17-4) will move on to the regional portion of the state tournament. Kentlake opens play at 1 p.m. on Saturday at Kent Memorial Park against Battle Ground, the No. 2 seed from the SeaKing-Southwest Bi-District tournament.<\/p>\n
Virtually everyone on Kentlake\u2019s roster delivered something against Beamer. The Falcons pounded out 14 hits, getting at least one from everyone in the starting lineup. In addition, every starter in the lineup \u2014 if they didn\u2019t have a courtesy runner come in \u2014 scored at least one run.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just got on a roll where the ball looked like a basketball coming at you. It\u2019s huge,\u201d Kentlake coach Jason Evans said. \u201cI think they\u2019re just in a zone right now.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve just got an unbeatable confidence right now, and the kids know they can get it done.\u201d<\/p>\n
They certainly did get it done last Saturday, particularly Wright and Nagel.<\/p>\n
Wright cruised through the first three innings unscathed, allowing the Falcons\u2019 offense to jump on Beamer starting pitcher Kelvin Ketchum early. Kentlake pounced to a quick 4-0 first-inning lead, keyed by a two-run double from Matt Smith.<\/p>\n
Andy Enders pushed that lead to 5-0 in the second, singling with one out, then moving to second and third on wild pitches before coming home on a sacrifice bunt by Marcus Evans.<\/p>\n
Beamer cut the deficit to 5-1 in the top of the fourth on an RBI-single to center field from Jacob Thielman.<\/p>\n
Kentlake added three more runs in the bottom half of that inning, highlighted by Nagel\u2019s RBI double off the left-center fence, giving the Falcons an 8-1 lead and essentially putting the game away.<\/p>\n
It was a typical calm performance from both Wright and Nagel, Jason Evans noted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey haven\u2019t all year,\u201d Evans said. \u201cAs a coach, you want to see more fire and more enthusiasm knowing they\u2019re ready to go and you just don\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut after knowing these guys all year … I just know if they give me a head nod, they\u2019re ready to go. They don\u2019t come to the field not prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n
No matter the time of season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Regular season or postseason.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-21396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21396"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21396\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21396"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=21396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}