By Richard Smith
Twitter: @rsmithYWV

Many of them looked forward to this baseball season for more than their four years at Mountain Ridge.

Most of the Mountain Lions’ 12 seniors — other than the Stancato twins, who moved in from Washington state in 2018 — had roots that went back to little league and had met each other between the ages of 9 and 12.

“I’ve been looking forward to this specific team since freshman year,” senior shortstop Travis Warinner said.

Warinner was the first player from the Class of 2020 to make his mark on the varsity, starting from early in his freshman year.

Pitchers Brock Peery and Zach Rogers got a couple chances as freshmen too. But coach Artie Cox, then pitching coach for Lance Billingsley, knew the 2020 group was special — and similar to the just-departed 2016 state runners up.

“This was the class we’ve been talking about since they came in,” Cox said. “This team here stacked up most closely with that 2016 team. We always seem to have good pitching. Like that 2016 team, we were really strong throughout the lineup.”

Entering this spring, the Mountain Lions returned 18 players from the 2019 team, including every starter except Tate Childers and every front-line pitcher other than Zach Martinez and Mason Piert.

Last year’s team struggled through a .500 regular season before catching fire. Mountain Ridge knocked Phoenix Brophy Prep and rival O’Connor out of the playoffs at their home ballparks to reach the double-elimination final 8.

After losing to eventual champion Chandler Hamilton, the Mountain Lions knocked out another rival in Liberty, then beat Hamilton to set up a winner-take-all game won by the Huskies. Improbably, Mountain Ridge had reached the final four after starting the playoffs the No. 19 seed.

Lead by the huge senior class, the Mountain Lions that arrived in the wake of the 2016 runner up and experienced second place in 2018, were determined to take the final step.

“They worked their tail ends off and that was something we noticed as a coaching staff. That was all they talked about — bringing Ridge baseball its first state title,” Cox said. “Honestly this was the first offseason where we watched all of them buy in.”

Now this team, and the other 6A teams gunning for that title will never know what might have been.

The spread of COVID-19 in the state caused a delay in the school year and spring sports season on March 13, then the end of in-person classes and sports on March 30.

“At first I don’t think it really hit us. Now it’s rough. We’re not going to get to play on that field again,” senior second baseman Colton Neville said.

The Mountain Lions rolled through the preseason Wayne Descombes Invitational, going 5-0 with wins over region rivals Phoenix Pinnacle and Liberty.

Their only loss was a bit of a surprise, an 8-4 road defeat at Brophy Prep March 5.

“Brophy played a very clean game and we were very sloppy. We played better after that,” Warinner said.

Mountain Ridge was one of the last teams to step onto the field, playing two games March 14 in the Boras Classic.

Cox’s team beat Utah powerhouses Copper Hills and Cottonwood that day. But the tournament would end halfway through and the “new normal” was sinking in.

“Nobody was shaking hands at the end of the games. One of the Utah teams was not shaking hands and were told by their admin not to come across and shake,” Cox said.

Originally, the Mountain Lions’ schedule would kick into gear after the Boras Classic. First was a March 19 trip to Mesa Desert Ridge.
Then Hamilton was to arrive March 27 for a showdown. When the season ended, the Huskies were 8-0 and ranked No. 1 in the nation by MaxPreps.

Needles to say, the last team to beat Hamilton was up for the challenge.

“Talk about this game was all over the place, when we were going to play Hamilton. It was going to be a great game for sure,” Neville said.

That game was only the launching pad into the brutal Desert Valley Region schedule — two games each against Boulder Creek, Scottsdale Chaparral, Liberty, O’Connor and Pinnacle.

Then the playoffs and the chance to raise the baseball program’s first banner.

Warinner was going to miss some of this. He was injured going into the season and later diagnosed  with a torn meniscus — though as he said he later found out he could return in the fourth week of April.

“We didn’t know what it was for the first couple weeks. So all I could do was play DH. Then I got an MRI and had to shut it down before the Boras Classic,” Warinner said.

As it turned out he missed only a couple more games than his teammates.

More than the playoffs, the Mountain Lions and their peers are likely to miss out on a senior prom and traditional graduation ceremony.

“All these kids have missed out on so much. They’re missing out on so many big parts of their lives,” Cox said.

One of the toughest aspects for this close-knit team was knowing it would have less time together.

Warinner said the seniors had an outstanding chemistry and there were no outcasts on the team.

“We got together maybe a week after the season ended, hanging out in our cars in the parking lot. Just throwing a football around. Just trying to get together one more time before we head off to different colleges,” Neville said.

And that is the silver lining. Nine of the 12 seniors have signed to play college baseball and a 10th — Garrett Olson — is playing golf for the University of Wisconsin-Parkside.

Cox said an 11th senior, outfielder Marshall Cross, should have college opportunities after getting to play more and being injury-free this year.

The 12th, pitcher Jack Talbott, is in line for academic and athletic scholarships, Cox said.

“I definitely want to get back together with these guys and have a year-end party when it’s safe,” Cox said.

Neville, whose father Jeremy is the Mountain Lions’ hitting coach, will stay in Glendale and attend college at Arizona Christian University. He said he likes everything bout the program and the belief system of the college. Colton plans to study business.

Warinner signed to play at Yavapai College in Prescott to showcase himself for four-year college teams at a junior college national championship contender, while having a similar experience of leaving the nest and living on campus.

“They’re in a really nice area and I can get away from home. I fell in love with their player development and coaching staff,” Warinner said.

Richard Smith
Associate Editor | Surprise & West Valley Preps
@rsmithYWV

rsmith@iniusa.org

Richard Smith has been with Independent Newsmedia since 2016, and worked at a Sun City-based news outfit covering the Northwest Valley for 22 consecutive years.

An NAU alum and lifelong Arizona resident, Richard began as a copy editor and page designer at Surprise Today and the Daily News-Sun, then rekindled his love of sports writing by taking the reins on West Valley Preps in 2008.

For most of the mid-2010s he was the Surprise editor and West Valley Preps reporter. Now he’s the West Valley Preps Editor and Surprise Associate Editor.

As COVID restrictions slowly lift, Richard is cautiously optimistic he will visit book stores, football fields and gyms again this fall.