SUNSET BASEBALL: Gorman stays alive with pair of wins

Bishop Gorman’s baseball team pitched its way to one win, and bashed its way to another Thursday as the Gaels staved off elimination in the Sunset Region tournament at Sierra Vista.

Alex Perron fired a three-hitter in a 5-0 win over Shadow Ridge, and the Gaels came back and had 13 hits, including four for extra bases, in a 16-7 win over Cimarron-Memorial in the losers’ bracket final.

Gorman (30-6-1) will face Bonanza (18-14) at 1 p.m. today at Sierra Vista. The Gaels would need to beat Bonanza twice to claim the region title.

“These type of tournaments kind of work in our favor a little bit,” Gorman coach Nick Day said. “I wouldn’t go out there and say we have the best pitching staff, but we have one of the deepest pitching staffs. And when you go late in a tournament like this where you’re playing every day, it kind of works to our advantage where some guys down on our depth chart are actually pretty good.”

Perron certainly was pretty good against Shadow Ridge (30-5). The lanky sophomore allowed just three singles and struck out six in silencing the Northwest League champions in the opener.

“He was outstanding,” Day said. “He’s just a sophomore, and he’s been good every time we’ve thrown him out on the mound this year. He just came out and attacked the strike zone. He throws pretty hard for being 100 pounds or whatever he is.”

Michael Blasko was 2-for-4 with a double and four RBIs in the opener to power the offense. He drove in a run with a groundout in the first and had a two-run single in the second as the Gaels took control from the start.

Gorman rolled early in the second game, too, scoring six runs in the third to stake starter Kai Domingo to a 9-0 lead.

“That was big,” Day said. “Kai Domingo’s been really good this year on the mound, but he wasn’t quite as sharp today. So getting those early runs was huge.”

Nick Gates was 3-for-4 with a homer and four RBIs in the second game. Cadyn Grenier was 2-for-4 with a triple and four RBIs, and Cole Krzmarzick doubled twice for the Gaels.

Tanner McAninch was 2-for-3 with a double and two RBIs to lead Cimarron (25-8), which twice cut the lead to five, but could get no closer.

“Give Cimarron credit,” Day said. “They kept swinging and making it interesting in those middle innings.”

Day said his team still has the arms left to get past Bonanza, which has beaten Gorman twice this season, including 8-5 on Tuesday.

The season isn’t over for the region’s runner-up, which will play the Sunrise runner-up at 10 a.m. on Saturday at Las Vegas High for the final berth at next week’s state tournament.

“Bonanza’s played us really tough every time and they’re pretty hot right now, but we’re going to try to get after them tomorrow and see if we can’t avoid Saturday,” Day said.