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Show s w c . . ,, - j W Vr Cedar High baseballer Craig Cardon dives back to the bag at first and barely beats the throw. The Redmen thought they had won two games from the Flyers last week, but Dixie protested one of the games and part of it had to be replayed Tuesday. Dixie turned the tables and won the game Tuesday 8-7. Advances to playoffs SUSC squad takes 2nd in tournament With their backs to the wall, SUSC showed their stuff in a "must" game against Southern Colorado. "We probably played our best game of the tournament," said Wilson. The Thunderbirds won 13-2. Kevin Donner went the distance on the hill, allowing eight hits. Curt Peterson, Armstrong, Roger Farnsworth, Dumont and Rivard each had at least a couple of hits in the contest, a and most of them chipped in with several RBIs. Following the win, SUSC was thrust into championship action against Mesa. SUSC would have had to win two games to w win the conference. The dropped initial game 8-3 to finish the tourney in second place. Freshman Ron Barrus started on the mound for Southern Utah. He had pitched a total of one inning this season prior to the championship game. He did an admirable job, and SUSC trailed 3-1 in the fifth inning. Mesa picked up two in the seventh to go up 5-1, and they netted three more in the eighth to go ahead 8-1. SUSC scored two in the ninth to cut the final margin to 8-3 Southern Utah left nine men in scoring position in the game. "We did not execute when we needed to," said Wilson. "We were mentally not real sharp." SUSC had four players named to the All-RMAC first team. Bergerhouse, Farnsworth, Johnson and Dumont were all cited for outstanding play. By MIKE CANNON Sports Writer LAS VEGAS, N.M. Southern Utah State College will be advancing to District Seven baseball play in Denver, Colo.; May 13-15, as the Thunderbirds Thun-derbirds placed second in the Rocky Mountain Athletic ; Conference Tournament Tour-nament conducted here over the weekend The defending RMAC champion T-Birds T-Birds were ousted from their top conference spot by Mesa , College. The two RMAC schools, along with independents in-dependents Grand Canyon and Metro State, will be the four schools involved in district play. The winner will ad-I ad-I vance to the National Athletic Intercollegiate In-tercollegiate Association tournament later this month. Despite a second-place finish and trip to the district tourney, SUSC coach Larry Wilson wasn't exhilerated with his team's performance over the weekend. '.'We're pleased to be going to districts, which was one of our primary goals," Wilson said. "We're disappointed disap-pointed that we didn't win the conference con-ference championship but, to be honest, we didn't play well enough to deserve to win it. We were very , inconsistent overall, and we didn't play with a pt intensity or enthusiasm." Wilson did feel the somewhat erratic play of the Thunderbirds could be attributed at-tributed to several things. SUSC could have b been slightly overconfident going into the tourney, and the tournament tour-nament itself was very poorly organized, according to Wilson. "The tournament itself was played in poor facilities and was organized poorly," commented Wilson. "Every coach I talked to was very displeased." One game had to be delayed two hours while awaiting an umpire. SUSC went into the tournament as the top-seeded top-seeded team, but they received no advantage from that ranking. They had to play the early-morning game four straight days, and Wilson felt fatigue was a factor. He was quick to point out that, though these things contributed to some inconsistent play, they were not excuses for it. And the play of the Thunderbirds wasn't that bad. They're just used to being on top. "We ended up with a real tough opener," said Wilson. Southern Utah played five games in the tournament, which was conducted Thursday through Sunday. It was originally supposed to go through Saturday. The 'Birds downed Southern Colorado 4-3 in their opener in 11 innings. They then dumped Regis 16-12, lost to Mesa 14-4, whipped Southern Colorado 13-2 and dropped another to Mesa 8-3. In the Southern Colorado contest, Gary "Tex" Cowart belted a home run with two outs and two strikes in the bottom of the ninth to send the game into extra innings. Cowart's blast tied the game at 2-2. USC then scored one in the top of the 11th, but Cowart again belted a home run, this time with Chris Rivard on base, to win the marathon in the 11th. Scott Bergerhouse saw mound duties for SUSC and went the distance, picking up the win. He allowed eight hits and threw well. Cowart had three hits, including his two round trippers. Kurt Kemp had a triple and a double. Floyd Armstrong, Doug Templeton and Jeff Dumont each had two hits a piece. SUSC got off to an easy start against Regis in game number two, scoring 10 runs in the first two innings. The 'Birds led 11-1 at the end of three. At that point, the roof crumbled temporarily on the Thunderbirds. Regis scored six in the fourth to narrow the gap to 11-7. They scored three in the sixth to make the score 11-10. Southern Utah scored two in the bottom of the sixth to pull ahead 13-10, but Regis scored two more in the seventh to again move within one at 13-12. SUSC scored three in the eighth to ice the victory, 16-12. Jim Kelly was the winning chucker for SUSC. Several relievers helped preserve the win. Cowart had another home run, and Dumont, Kenp and Mark Johnson each went four for six at the plate on the day. SUSC then faced Mesa in the winner's bracket. The T-Birds led 4-1 at the end of five innings. Mesa got a grand slam in the sixth following a couple of Thunderbird walks and errors to load the bases. That put the Mavericks on top 5-4. They scored five in the seventh, thougn Wilson felt SUSC got the short end of two questionable calls. Mesa scored two runs in both the eighth and ninth innings to win it 14-4. Don Gubler allowed only four hits in five innings before being removed. He was tagged with the loss. |