The Western Nebraska Community College baseball team is ready to open the Region IX tournament that begins Thursday at Damon Runyon Sports Complex in Pueblo, Colorado.
The Cougars, who finished the year 22-33 overall and 14-14 in conference, earned the fourth seed in the tournament and will battle fifth-seeded Otero College Thursday, May 7 at 2 p.m.
The other first-round contest has third-seeded McCook Community College taking on sixth-seeded Luna Community College at 11 a.m.
WNCC coach Mike Jones said this team is ready to go and that they prepared the pitching staff in last weekend's four-game series for this weekend.
"It was an interesting type of situation where we felt like our playoff spot was pretty well locked in," Jones said. "We wanted to prepare our pitching staff and the entire staff. We're going to get everybody innings. We want to make sure that we rested everybody including the guys that have been throwing a lot. So, it came down to more of a management situation for our ball club to make sure everybody was ready to go coming into the tournament. So we kind of used the four games as a conditioning and evaluation."
The tournament features a wide-open field with any team capable of winning the tournament. This year, however, there is plenty of incentive for the team to win as it is Region IX's team to host the West Plains District Tournament next week. Plus, if NJC wins the tournament, the runner-up team will also qualify for the district tournament. If another team besides NJC wins, the Plainsmen will qualify for districts as the winner of the Empire Conference.
"This is our year as Region 9 to host the Western District Final, so if we can win the Region 9 tournament this year, the Western District Tournament will be played here at Cleveland Field in Scottsbluff," he said. "You'll find the winner of Region I, which is down in Arizona and Nevada, and you'll find the region winner of Region 18 over there in Utah and Idaho that will be showing up here."
Any team can win the tournament this season. Jones said it definitely is up for grabs.
" I really think it's wide open. I mean, we've seen everybody," Jones said. "There are some things about every single team that I really like. I think everybody has a couple of things that make them extremely good ball clubs. So, seeing the matchups and how it's going to piece together, who's going to end up playing better on that day is the key. This is a wide-open tourney. We're really going to see some excitement during this tournament. There's going to be some things happen that people will not be ready for."
The tournament will feature six teams with the top two teams receiving a first-round bye. Thursday's action has McCook and Luna facing each other at 11 a.m. with WNCC taking on Otero at 2 p.m. The two losers will then meet Thursday evening at 5 p.m. in an elimination game.
Friday's action pits the WNCC/Otero winner against top-seed Northeastern Junior College at 11 a.m. followed by the McCook/Luna winner battling second-seeded Southeast Community College at 2 p.m. Another elimination game will be played at 5.
The games continues through Sunday with championship Sunday with the winner advancing to the district finals May 15-18 at the Region IX tournament winner.
Jones said a lot of things happen during the Region IX tourney as teams that get hot do well. So, with that mind frame, it will be anyone's tourney to take.
"A lot of things happen in the Region IX tournament. You'll find teams that get hot. You'll find teams that panic. You'll find teams that play extremely fundamental and make every single play and find ways to win. A lot of things happen" he said. "I've seen a bunch of it in my time during this Region IX tournament. I don't know exactly what to tell you what is going to happen, but I can tell you our ball club is going to play aggressive. We're going to go into this tournament like we're going to play to win, we're not going to play not to lose; we're going to play to win. It might turn out that we create some mistakes. You know, that might be overaggressive when we might make a few mistakes, but we're definitely going to play aggressive."
The Cougars won the series in their meeting this season with Otero, going 3-1. WNCC lost the opener 5-1 and then won the next three by 10 runs. Jones said he knows the Rattlers have a good number-one pitcher and his team will need to be ready.
"The matchup with their game one guy, who goes with a change-up, slider, throws a lot of strikes, keeps the ball down in the zone, mixes up speeds, and isn't afraid to throw any pitch in any count," he said. "So, it does not allow you to sit on certain pitches in certain counts, certain situations. You got to be prepared for everything. Either that or you better just choose one and stay on that pitch. So, we will put together the best game plan that we can, compete with two strikes and put the ball in play. We will try to control second base and get into scoring position as much as we can."
WNCC has shown plenty of power this season this season, registering 92 home runs and 96 doubles. They also have 18 triples. The Cougars' long-ball barrage is led by Catcher Gladysh with 14 home runs followed by Harrison Hart with 13, Will Harbison with 11, and Vaughn Wilson, Dakota Alber, and Jude Russell with seven each.
Gladysh leads the team with a .379 average followed by Hart at .373, Ty Beutner at .372 and then Harbison and Vaughn Wilson at .342 and .341.
Jones said that the Pueblo Field is similar to Cleveland Field so it should be suitable to their power game.
"We're going to be in Pueblo and the Pueblo field is very similar to Cleveland. So, you can get the ball out of the yard for sure," he said. "You can leave the yard, but it is not easy. For us offensively there has been some really good power throughout the year, for sure.:
Region IX-Tournament
Thursday May 7
Game 1 – MCC vs. Luna, 11 am
Game 2 – Western Nebraska vs. Otero, 2 p.m.
Game 3 – Losers of Game 1 vs. Losers Game 2 (elimination game)
Friday, May 8
Game 4 – Winner of Game 2 vs. Northeastern JC, 11 a.m.
Game 5 – Winner of Game 1 vs. Southeast Community College, 2 p.m.
Game 6 – Winner Game 3 vs. lowest remaining seed with one loss, 5 p.m.
Saturday, May 9
Game 7 – Game 6 Winner vs. highest seed remaining with one loss, 11 a.m.
Game 8 – Game 4 Winner vs. Game 5 Winner, 2 p.m.
Game 9 – Game 7 Winner vs. Game 8 Loser, 5 p.m.
Sunday, May 10
Game 10 – Game 8 Winner vs. Game 9 Winner, 11 a.m.
Game 11 – If necessary, 2 p.m.
Western District Tournament
At site of Region IX Tournament winner
May 15-18
DIVISION 1 JUCO WORLD SERIES
Sam Suplizio Field – Grand Junction, Colo.
May 24, 25th, or 26th – Juco World Series begins