Moses Lake sweeps Eisenhower, clinches No. 3 district seed

MOSES LAKE — Cameron Duke grew up a Chief.

His uncle Eric Duke was an all-state outfielder for Moses Lake in the early 2000s, sparking Cameron’s love of the game. So it was extra special when Eric was able to make the trip back to his old stomping grounds to watch his nephew’s two final regular season home games.

“He’s kind of my inspiration to why I play the game so having him here really meant a lot,” Cameron Duke said.

Eric Duke was treated to a show as Moses Lake swept Eisenhower 10-0 and 5-1 to lock down the No. 3 district seed.

Moses Lake’s (12-6, 12-8) four seniors contributed throughout Friday’s doubleheader.

Cameron Duke totaled two hits, one run and one RBI on the day. Cain Valdez started Game 2 and pitched four innings with no hits. Caleb Juarez saved a run in the late game by tagging out Hunter Meyer on a scary collision at home plate. Carter Stout began Moses Lake’s five-run fourth inning of the second game with a triple.

“We’ve got some guys who just are ballplayers,” head coach Quintz Whitaker said. “I think overall if you were to look at the four guys that we have, kind of their characteristics, we’ve got a couple of them that are captains and they know their role and they do their job.

“The other two guys that we have are same thing. They’re guys that give us what they got. They know what their roles are and they just go out and do the job. I think that’s the easiest way to describe them. They’re good kids, they do their work in school and they go out and do their job at the end of the day so that part makes it easy.”

Moses Lake needed at least one win to secure the No. 3 seed to districts. That box was checked quickly after a six-run second inning allowed the Chiefs to win the opener 10-0 in five innings.

Austin Valdez recorded the first of his three RBI on a double in the first inning. Evan McLean, Zach Valdez, Kameron Huberdeau and Brandon Swett also drove runs in.

Ezekyel Ochoa and Jordan Rios pitched a combined shutout and allowed one hit each.

It took a bit longer for Moses Lake to break through against Eisenhower’s Game 2 starter Austin Rowe.

Moses Lake left the bases loaded in the first inning and stranded runners the next two.

“One of the things we’ve really stressed is trying to continually put pressure on the other team,” Whitaker said. “Obviously, we don’t always have the ability to control how the other team defends us or that kind of thing, but to really work hard to get a guy on base every inning.

“You might not think that’s a big deal sometimes, but really if you can just keep applying that pressure... Keep squeezing that coal it’s going to turn into something.”

Stout began the transformation from coal to diamond with a lead-off triple in the fourth inning. Stout later scored on a squeeze bunt by Cody Alvarado. Josh Williams came around to score on a throwing error and Cameron Duke tallied his RBI on a sac fly. Jordan Rios had a flair that dropped into left field that scored two runners to punctuate the big inning.

That was more than enough for McLean who threw the final three innings.

Moses Lake will host a district play-in game Tuesday, 5 p.m., against Sunnyside.

“We’re just fighting week by week just to stay with each other because some of these guys I’ll never play with again,” Cameron Duke said.

Game 1

E — 0 0 0 0 0 0

ML — 1 6 1 2 10

Highlights: Austin Valdez 3 RBI, 1 R, 2B; Zach Valdez 1 RBI, 2 R, 2B; McLean 2 RBI, 2 R; Huberdeau 1 RBI, 1 R; Swett 1 RBI, 1 R

Game 2

E — 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1

ML — 0 0 0 5 0 0 5

Highlights: Cameron Duke 2x2, 1 RBI; Alvarado 2x3, 1 RBI, 1 R; Cain Valdez 4 IP, 0 H