DENVER | No matter what field Silver Creek’s Austin Wood pitched on Wednesday, he was in the zone.
It just so happened the venue was Coors Field — home of the Colorado Rockies — and the Raptors’ right-hander made life difficult on a Rangeview baseball team that had been pretty good offensively all season long.
Wood lost a perfect game with two outs in the fifth inning on a base hit by Zach Sheppard, but quelled a Raiders offense that had scored nine runs or more in each of the past four games in a 9-2 non-league victory for Silver Creek, the top-ranked team in Class 4A. Coach Brian Gausman’s Rangeview team — playing against Silver Creek at Coors Field for the third straight season — scored both its runs in the sixth inning after Wood departed.
“I think it’s a big outfield and guys’ eyes get big,” said Gausman, whose Raiders (6-4) came into the game on a four-game streak of scoring nine runs or more.
“Sometimes they think, ‘I’m in a major league park, I want to do major league things,’ instead of just putting the barrel on the ball. We struggled with that for a couple of innings and he (Wood) was outstanding. He hit his spots and got in a groove.”
Senior shortstop Josh Schumacher tripled in a run and sophomore CJ Peacock drove in senior Edgar Castaneda with a sacrifice fly to account for the both runs scored by Rangeview in the sixth inning.
After Wood set a tone with a 1-2-3 top of the first, Silver Creek got to Rangeview starter Thomas Rutherford in the bottom half of the frame by scoring three times, taking advantage of three hits and three walks.
Gausman turned to senior Anthony Gustin with two outs in the inning and bases loaded and the left-hander got a strikeout to end the frame. Gustin and junior Gonzalo Luevano held the Raptors to just two runs over the next four innings, but the Raiders’ offense got very little going against Wood.
Rutherford got robbed of a base hit on a diving stop by Silver Creek first baseman Nick Hartman, but Sheppard finally broke through in the fifth as he ripped a solid base hit to left field. Wood struck out the side in the inning, however.
“He had our number the first few innings, but we had to just keep swinging and we knew it would come around,” Sheppard said. “I had one to center field that I thought was going to get down, but didn’t. That first hit was a big relief.”
Wood departed in favor of reliever Nick Gambirasi, who allowed Rangeview’s two-run rally in the sixth.
Castaneda reached on an error to open the inning and went to third on an overthrow on a bunt from sophomore Andrew Cooper.
Peacock plated a run with a sacrifice fly and Schumacher racked up his team-leading 16th RBI of the season with triple that reached the wall in right field and allowed pinch runner Devan Gibson to score from first base.
“I got into one, finally,” said Schumacher, who had the only extra base hits among the 15 the teams combined for on the day.
“It was a low fastball on the inner half of the plate and I just turned on it and got it over the outfielder’s head,” he added.
Silver Creek — which pounded out 13 singles — tacked on four runs in the top of the seventh inning to put the game away.
Despite the result, which dropped the Raiders to 1-2 against Silver Creek in the three meetings at Coors Field, the experience is something none of the Rangeview players would pass up for any reason.
From hanging out in the clubhouse to warming up in the Rockies’ bullpen and sitting on the same bench that so many major leaguers have years is always meaningful.
“I love it here, it’s great stepping into the same box and Tulo (former Rockie Troy Tulowitzski) and Cargo (Carlos Gonzalez) and playing on the same dirt as those guys,” Schumacher said.
Gausman — who took over as head coach this season after spending the past four seasons on the staff of former coach Mike Hamilton — also enjoyed seeing players such as Gustin rise to the occasion on a big stage.
“Anthony’s seen only limited innings for us, but he came in and did an outstanding job,” Gausman said. “That’s the reason why you play here, to give kids memories like that. It was a pretty special day for him and some other guys.”
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at 303-750-7555 or sports@aurorasentinel.com. Twitter: @aurorasports. FB: Aurora Prep Sentinel
SILVER CREEK 9, RANGEVIEW 2
Score by innings (r-h-e):
Rangeview 000 002 0 — 2 2 1
Silver Creek 301 104 x — 9 13 3
RANGEVIEW (ab-r-h-rbi)
CJ Peacock lf 3-0-0-1, Thomas Rutherford p 2-0-0-0, Gonzalo Luevano p 1-0-0-0, Josh Schumacher ss 3-0-1-1, Jared Clanton 3b 1-0-0-0, Isaiah Carrillo 3b 2-0-0-0, Jace Lester cf 2-0-0-0, Zach Sheppard 1b 3-0-1-0, Anthony Sanchez rf 3-0-0-0, Sebastian Wiegand 2b 1-0-0-0, Edgar Castaneda 2b 2-1-0-0, Andrew Cooper c 2-0-0-0, Devan Gibson pr 0-1-0-0. Totals 25-2-3-2. Pitching (ip-h-r-er-bb-so): Thomas Rutherford (L, 2/3-3-3-3-3-0), Anthony Gustin (2 1/3-2-1-0-1-3), Gonzalo Luevano (2-4-1-1-0-0), Devan Gibson (1-4-4-4-1-0)
SILVER CREEK (ab-r-h-rbi)
Cole Winn 2b 4-1-1-2, George Ramirez cf 4-1-1-1, Nick Metcalf ss 4-2-3-0, Austin Wood p 3-1-1-0, Cason Winn 2b 4-0-1-1, Max Browne lf 4-1-2-3, Dylan Kramer 2-0-1-0, Adam Wager 3b 1-1-1-0, Cade Call DH 0-0-0-0, Nick Hartman 1b 1-1-0-1, Sam Elting rf 2-0-1-0, Cole Borrego rf 2-0-1-0. Totals 31-9-13-8. Pitching (ip-h-r-er-bb-so): Austin Wood (W, 5-1-0-0-0-9), Nick Gambiriasi (1-1-2-0-0-0), Dylan Ordway (1-0-0-0-0-2).
3B — Rangeview: Josh Schumacher.
