Thursday, Apr. 17, 2008

Prep notebook: Pasco baseball shows resiliency

By Kevin Anthony, Herald staff writer

The word "resilient" comes up frequently when talking with Pasco baseball coach Gary Jonas and his players.

Maybe that's because the Bulldogs, who went 0-20 two seasons ago and 4-16 last year, are off to a 7-4 start and, at 3-1, are tied with defending state champion and tradition-laden Richland atop the CBL 4A standings.

"To be totally honest, we saw some glimpses of that last year," said second-year coach Gary Jonas, whose club swept Wenatchee in extra innings in its league opener and then split with Moses Lake.

Jonas became the fifth Pasco coach in nine years when he took over the team last season. As a player under DeSales great Kim Cox, he helped win three state B titles from 1991-94.

Jonas and pitching coach Scott Estes, a Kennewick grad who played at Columbia Basin College, have helped turn around a perennial loser, and it started with turning around attitudes.

"We talked a year ago, that was the expectation: going out and competing with anybody," Jonas said, pointing to last year's regular-season finale with Richland.

After getting no-hit by the Bombers in the opening game, the Bulldogs built a lead in the nightcap and forced Richland to come back in the seventh inning to pull out the win.

"That kind of shows our resiliency," Jonas said.

The Bombers went on to win the state title; Pasco went on to build some confidence.

"That gave us hope that we could play with these guys," said Josh Boles, a second-team CBL 4A pick last year as a pitcher and utility infielder.

Boles and fellow seniors Zach Banks, a catcher, and center fielder Steven Goulet were regulars on that 0-20 team and formed a core for Jonas to build around.

"They stuck with it, when so many kids don't these days," the coach said.

Boles said one of the big differences is "it feels like we became a family.

"It feels awesome," Boles said. "Everyone on the team feels excited. We're taking it one game at at time, but we want to go somewhere."

-- The CWAC has seen some serious blowouts this season and, more than any other league, truly is composed of haves and have-nots.

Ellensburg leads the league, but Othello, Selah, East Valley and Ephrata (those five teams are a combined 47-13) are close behind.

In fact, Othello was a half-game behind Ellensburg in second place before losing 6-0 and 11-4 to the Bulldogs last Saturday. Those losses were enough to drop the Huskies all the way to fifth.

Meanwhile, Quincy, Wapato, Grandview, Prosser and Toppenish are a combined 13-47.

Ellensburg coach Jim Klampher said that after so many blowouts this season, he was pleased to see his players could play situational ball against Othello.

"It's good to play baseball," he said. "We played small ball today. We were aggressive on the basepaths instead of going up and ... it's good to play baseball and not just go up and whack the ball has hard as you can."

-- The CBL still is out of session, with the 3A and 4A teams playing nonleague games Friday.

The top five CWAC teams are pitted against their bottom five counterparts Saturday, but the SCAC East offers a possible solid matchup with top-ranked Kiona-Benton (4-0) playing at Royal (2-2).