RENO - Tim Miranda pitched one of the best games of his young life, allowing perennial powerhouse Washoe just five hits.
Unfortunately for Carson American's 11-12 all-star team, Washoe's trio of Sean Prihar, Adam Bailey and Eric Housley was a tad better.
The Washoe trio allowed just three hits and fanned 12 to eliminate Carson American from the District 1 playoffs, 3-0, Sunday at Swope Middle School.
"Timmy pitched an awesome game," Carson manager John Valley said. "He did everything we wanted him to. We knew we had to play good defense and pitch well, and we did. We knew we had to generate some offense, and we tried."
It looked as if Carson might punch a run across a run or two in the first. After two outs, Dom Mariani hit what appeared to be a homer over the left-field fence off Washoe starter Prihar. The third-base umpire ruled it a ground-rule double, however.
"I saw it bounce," Valley said. "He hit it well."
Bickel followed with a single, sending Mariani to third. Prihar struck out Blake Plattsmier to end the threat.
Carson had another shot to score in the second when Anthony Torkeo hit a ground-rule double to right field with one out. Prihar was equal to the challenge, striking out David Charles and Miranda to end the inning.
Washoe, which only had a runner as far as second in the first three innings, finally broke through against Miranda in the fourth.
Tanner Murray singled, advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on Tyler Washell's two-out single behind second base. Plattsmier made a good play on the ball, but his throw home was off the mark.
The score stayed that way until the top of the sixth.
Bailey singled with one out and was sacrificed to second. He scored on Garrett Shutt's single up the middle. Two more singles accounted for the final run.
Carson put runners on first and second with two outs in the sixth, but Housley struck out the next hitter.
"I think we played well this tournament," Valley said. "The kids worked hard for two weeks. We had to teach them a lot of things. We had kids playing positions they'd never played before, especially in the outfield.
"My goal was to teach them fundamentals that they can carry on to the next level, and I hope I did that."
9-10 Tournament
RENO AMERICAN WEST 12,
CARSON AMERICAN 2
Reno American West exploded for six runs in the third inning to eliminate the Carson squad from the playoffs.
"Errors will kill you, and we had them at inopportune times," said Carson manager Ron Pacheco, whose squad committed four errors. "I'm still proud of this team. We played a tough team. They had allowed only eight runs the entire tournament, and we scored twice against them. We just came up a little short."
Carson was trailing just 5-2 when Reno American West put together its big inning, which included a walk, three errors and four hits to take an 11-2 lead. Anthony Calton delivered the big blow - a two run double.
Reno American ended the game in the fourth inning with a single run when Cody Kuhne walked and came around to score on two passed balls and a wild pitch. The umpires stopped the game because of the 10-run rule.
Carson managed just four hits, three coming in the second when it scored its only runs of the game.
David Yamamoto singled home Dylan Sawyers, who had singled, with Carson's first run. Ben Drozdof bunted home Zach White, who doubled, with the second run. White also had a fourth-inning single for Carson.
RENO CONTINENTAL 14,
CARSON NATIONAL 12
Carson fought back from an 8-0 deficit to tie the game at 9, but yielded five runs in the last two innings and was eliminated.
"We battled hard all day," Carson National manager Gerry Okimura said. "The whole game we kept coming back. We dug ourselves a hole early, but we came back.
"You can't give up the extra base against a team like this. You have to make the plays. You can't give them four, five, six outs."
Okimura was alluding to the five physical errors and a couple of other balls that should have been caught.
Reno Continental scored four runs in each of the first two innings to take an 8-0 lead, using six walks, two RBIs by Davone Gorman and a run-scoring double by Jorge Medina. The remainder of the runs scored on passed balls and wild pitches.
Carson National roared back with six runs of its own in the top of the third thanks to two Reno errors, a single by Gehrig Tucker and a two-run triple by Cody Scarlett, who went 4-for-4 and drove in four runs.
Reno tacked on a run in the bottom of the third to make it 9-6 on a triple by Brendan Suarle and an infield out by O'Keefe Hall.
Carson tied it in the top of the fourth when Chance Quilling (2-for-5) singled, stole second and scored on two wild pitches. Scarlett delivered a one-out, two-run single to score the final two runs.
Reno took the lead for good, 12-9, with three run in the last of the fourth on Suarle's bases-loaded triple that was misjudged by the Carson right fielder. Just for good measure, Anthony Casazza hit a two-run single in the fifth, extending the lead to 14-9.
"This was a great group of kids," said Okimura, whose team went 2-3. "They have nothing to hang their heads about."
