Tim Martinez: Wild week to close out play in 4A GSHL baseball season

May 6-One of the best thing about sports, and especially high school sports, is the unscripted drama.

Even after covering preps for as long as I've been, there is still the chance you'll get to see something you haven't seen before.

That happened last Thursday when James Gill III hit a walk-off, two-run home run to lift Battle Ground to a 6-5 win over Union, giving the Tigers the 4A Greater St. Helens League title.

"Haven't been a part of that, at all, ever," Battle Ground coach Seth Johnson said. "You know, a meaningful game with a walk-off homer. I haven't been part of that my whole career."

And I can't remember seeing something like that either. But really, we need to fully set the scene.

Battle Ground and Union went into last week tied atop the 4A GSHL standings. That meant their three-game series last week was essentially a best-of-3 for the league title.

It would be Union's first league title since 2014, or Battle Ground's first since 2017.

Union won Monday's game 6-1, meaning the Titans would take the title with a win Tuesday.

Tuesday's game remained 0-0 through nine innings. ...

After Battle Ground had the go-ahead run at third with one out in the seventh before Parker Christian got an inning-ending strikeout with the bases loaded. ...

After Union had a runner thrown out at the plate in the bottom of the seventh.

Battle Ground pushed across the game's first run with a bases-loaded hit batter in the top of the 10th. But Union tied it on Blake Sutton's RBI single in the bottom of the 10th.

Collin McGowan put the Tigers ahead to stay with an RBI double in the top of 13th, and the Tigers escaped with a 2-1 victory.

Micah Rice covered Tuesday's game. I drew the assignment for Thursday, thinking Tuesday's game could not be topped.

Well ...

Union scored four runs in the fourth to take a 4-1 lead and pushed its lead to 5-1 after the top of the fifth.

It did not look good for Battle Ground.

"Getting down (5-1) with that good of an arm on the mound (Union's Jacob Chandler) is tough," Johnson said. "You've got to try to chip away one run at a time."

The Tigers answered with three runs in the bottom of the fifth on an RBI single by Gill, a wild pitch and a triple by Dayton Mahoney.

"That fifth inning was huge for us, to get back into the game," Johnson said.

The Tigers went to the bottom of the seventh still trailing 5-4. But they were set up nicely with their 2-3-4 hitters due up.

McGowan got things started with a one-out single to right, which brought Gill to the plate.

Gill has seen a lot of pitches out of the strike zone this season as opponents often chose to work around the University of Washington commit.

It left Gill pressing a bit.

Johnson said he considered sending McGowan on a steal attempt of second. But he didn't want McGowan to get thrown out.

Even a successful steal may have enticed Union to walk Gill with first base open, even if it meant putting the winning run on base. Gill had already jumped ahead on the count 2-0.

Then Gill fouled off a fastball.

"I could just see that James looked comfortable, looked good with pitch before," Johnson said. "And then (the pitcher) came with the breaking ball, and James got it on the barrel. He was out in front, but got it on the barrel. So he obviously has enough power, that if he gets it on the barrel it can go."

Johnson said that even though the ball was carrying to right field, he wasn't sure if the ball would go over the fence.

Gill had no doubt after he made contact.

"Oh yeah," Gill said. "I knew it was gone."

It set off a celebration nine years in the making for Battle Ground.

"That's as excited as I've been on a field in a long time," Johnson said. "I got emotional as I was coming down to home plate. And even as we came out here, I had some tears. I don't know why. ... I'm not normally a crier. I had to gather myself a bit."

The veteran coach he is, Johnson sent his players off to celebrate with their families before delivering a post-game speech to the team.

It was a great scene, one that even those on the Union side of the field had to appreciate.

A moment like that, a series like that, takes two teams to happen. The Titans played their part, even if the pain of how close they came to being the ones celebrating will linger for a while.

It was a great moment for high school baseball.

"It's great to go up against Billy," Johnson said of Union coach Billy Hayes. "His teams always play hard. They have grit, and that's what they're known for. They play hard. You know it's not going to be easy. And our players showed grit and played hard as well.

"Huge, huge to win those two games, especially as we lead into the playoffs. Because every team is going to be like this. It kind of prepares you for the intensity and speed of the game that you see in the playoffs."

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