Story and photos by Richard Allan

The Dunsmuir Tigers started the NSCIF Division-VI baseball championship game on Saturday saying, “You’ve gotta believe.”

Dunsmuir was at the end of a season where several of its games were canceled due to inclement weather, including a two-week layoff. The freshman-rich Tigers entered the playoffs with only 10 contests under their belts—the fewest amount of any team in the playoffs.

The third-seeded Tigers defeated American Christian Academy 18-8 in the first round of the playoffs. Then, they had to come from behind to beat number-two Big Valley 9-8 on the road in the semifinals. So, playing for the section title on a neutral field at Shasta College, the Tigers certainly believed they could be section champs. But their playoff run came to a close with a second place finish as they fell to the top seeded Princeton Eagles 7-3. Dunsmuir also finished as the runner up to Princeton last season, losing at home 7-5.

“I’m proud of you guys and the way you competed,” Dunsmuir coach Rich Belzer said to his players after the game.

Belzer elected to go with Colton “Crash” Sordahl on the mound in the championship game. Sordahl played behind the plate most of the season and only had six innings of work on the hill in the regular season. Sordahl looked like he’d been hurling all season and fanned five in the contest. Belzer said the decision to start Sordahl was easy.

“There wasn’t anything to think about,” Belzer said. “He can pitch. He’s been catching because that’s what we needed him to do.”

The Tigers (10-3) went up 1-0 in the first inning. LT Hisey hit a two-out triple to right field then scored on a passed ball. But the Eagles (13-11) brought 10 batters to the plate and scored five runs in the second inning to take the lead. A couple of walks and a couple errors led to a run. Then, just when it looked like the Tigers were going to get out of the inning after a couple shallow fly ball outs, the Eagles came up with four hits and four more runs for a 5-1 advantage.

Belzer told his team they were still in it and urged them to continue to battle when they came off the field, “You gotta believe,” he said.

The Tigers responded and started to claw their way back. Mason Mekeel hit a triple to right center with one-out in the top of the third, and scored on a Willie Greeno single up the middle.

Jake Mekeel tripled to deep center field to lead off the fourth. The Eagle catcher tried to catch Mekeel napping at third but threw the ball away and the Tigers cut the deficit to 5-3.

The Tigers looked to be gaining momentum and retired the first two Eagles in the bottom half of the frame. However, the Eagles rallied with a walk and two singles, plating a pair of runs to lead by four after four, 7-3.

Hisey pitched the fifth and sixth innings, striking out three to finish the game, but the Tigers’ offense couldn’t muster another rally as the Eagles held on for the section title.

Note: This is only the second season for the resurrected Dunsmuir varsity baseball program. Over those two seasons, the Tigers are 21-7, with two NSCIF D-VI runner up plaques.

SiskiyouYouth.com contributor Richard Allan is the Sports Editor at The InterMountain News, in Burney. Thanks go out to Richard for taking time out of his busy schedule to cover the Dunsmuir game for SiskiyouYouth. He usually covers Burney, Fall River and Big Valley for The InterMountain News. You can check out some of his other playoff coverage at theimnews.com