Rams baseball, softball suffer subpar seasons

School is out and the long, hot summer is upon us. Maricopa Unified School District welcomes two new members to its ranks with Athletic Director Mark Cisterna and football coach Chris McDonald.

McDonald joins a batch of relatively new coaches at Maricopa High School. Andrew Pollak finished his first year at the helm of the baseball team, and Chris Ansley has headed up the softball team for four seasons.

Baseball
Pollak’s baseball team started off the season well. Winners of six of their first 10 games, the Rams looked to put to rest any questions about the team’s inability to stay competitive. Senior pitcher Dallas Speer was 3-1 and Tristan Hartley was 2-1 at the time, and the future looked bright for the Rams.

Unfortunately, Maricopa hit hard times and grabbed only two more wins the rest of the year, finishing 8-17 overall with a 2-9 section record.

However, it wasn’t all bad news for Pollak and his varsity squad. They had the highest single-game, on-base percentage in school history (.733) Feb. 27 against Arizona Charter Academy. Even in a March 25 defeat to Catalina Foothills, the Rams tied the program record with fewest strikeouts in a game with zero.

Sophomore Tyler Rapp led all batters with a .323 batting average and paced the team with 19 runs scored. Junior Nick Diaz led the team with 12 RBIs, three home runs and was tied for the team lead in triples (one) and hits (21). Senior Tristan Hartley shared the team lead for hits and led the Rams with two doubles. Senior Noah Anderson tied for the team lead in triples.

Softball
The softball team had a bumpy start to its 2014 season, losing three of its first four games, including a 25-0 loss to Xavier Prep. Ansley’s squad turned the season around when it hosted the annual Krystin Diehl Tournament, winning six straight and outscoring opponents 52-4 to earn the championship trophy.

The Lady Rams split the next eight games with big wins over Horizon Honors, Seton Catholic and Coronado, scoring double digits, but they suffered tough losses to Flowing Wells and Salpointe Catholic, both in Tucson.

A late season swoon doomed the softball team. The Rams dropped their final nine games of the season. Heartbreaking losses to Cibola (12-10) and Poston Butte (8-6) ended the season and the Rams finished 11-16 overall, 1-8 in section.

Sophomore pitcher Yasmin Santa Cruz finished the season 3-1 with a 3.75 ERA. Fellow sophomore Amber Cramer ended with a 4-3 record and 3.85 ERA. Junior Victoria Andrade led all pitchers with 49 strikeouts.

On the offensive side of the ball, senior catcher Madison Moncel fueled the Rams with a monstrous .436 batting average and 34 hits. Moncel was tied for the team lead with 26 runs and three triples. Keeping up with Moncel in runs was senior Chelsea Trejo, while senior Madison Byrd and junior Shay Barney were tied in the triples category. Junior Isabel McCloskey powered the team with 35 RBI and nine doubles.

***ADVERTISEMENT***Moncel signed a Letter of Intent earlier this year to play at Colby Community College in northwest Kansas.