With two outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth inning, Chris Powell's persistence paid off, and in a big way, for the Lewis-Clark Twins in the title game of the Dwight Church Tournament.
With two balls and two strikes against him, Powell fouled off two more pitches before connecting on a grand slam to dead center field that would give Wyatt Baldwin all the run support he'd need to help the hosts close out the Missoula Mavericks 6-2 at Harris Field.
Earlier in the afternoon, L-C (8-2) dominated the Hanford Flames 11-0 in five innings.
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| 2017 Dwight Church Champions
Powell's title-game bomb turned a one-run lead into a five-run lead and capped an impressive two-out rally from the home team. After Riley Way and and A.J. Davis grounded out to open the fifth, Chase Adkison doubled, then scored on Luke White's single to give the Twins a 2-1 edge. Jaden Phillips singled and Danny Robinson walked to load the bases for Powell.
Powell leveled a 1-2 count to 2-2 then fouled off a pair of pitches to stay alive.
"Once he fouled off the first picth, the dugout started getting louder and louder," L-C coach Kevin Maurer said. "When he finally connected on it, it was a pretty exciting moment for our squad.
"Just in that inning, the way our guys competed at the plate, they had a lot of tough at-bats as a whole."
Equally impressive was the pitching effort the Twins received from Baldwin. The Lewiston High standout needed only 57 pitches to go the distance, despite conceding a leadoff home run in the top of the first inning. In five of his seven innings, Baldwin threw less than 10 pitches.
"For him to challenge every single guy after that (home run) was pretty impressive," Maurer said.
The third element of the Twins' championship was defense. One day after L-C committed five errors in a single game against the same Mavericks squad, the Twins managed to go 12 innings - five against Hanford and seven against Missoula - without making a single defensive mistake.
"Our defense got a lot of baseballs in that game and they made play after play behind (Wyatt)," Maurer said.
In the early game, L-C starter Cooper Lund didn't give up a free pass and only conceded three hits in a shutout effort. The highlight, though, was when Lund caught a Hanford runner snoozing in the fourth inning and executed the first successful pickoff of his career.
That netted Lund a $50 prize from one L-C parent in attendance.
"He was pretty excited when that happened," Maurer added.
Hanford Flames 000 00- 0 3 1
Lewis-Clark Twins 146 0x-11 7 0
Poletski, Oldfield (5) and Young. Lund and Fuller.
Hanford hits - Simpkins, Manderbach, Young.
Lewis-Clark hits - Way (2B), Davis, Phillips (2B), Washburn (3B), Baldwin (2B), Fuller, Olson.
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Missoula Mavericks 100 000 1-2 5 1
Lewis-Clark Twins 001 050 x-6 10 0
Stevens, Martin (6) and Schock. Baldwin and Adkison.
Missoula hits - Yovetich (HR), Fraser 2, Schock (2B), Richardson.
Lewis-Clark hits - Davis, Adkison 2 (2B), White 2, Phillips, Powell 2 (HR), Shoults, Olson.
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