Big Park Community School will have one final Saturday in the sun April 23 when its top-seeded baseball team hosts the Verde Valley Small Schools Athletic Association Baseball Tournament.
With two more wins, the 7-1 Coyotes can hang a final title banner in a gym that faces its end following the Sedona-Oak Creek School District’s March 23 decision to move all seventh- and eighth-graders — and their sports teams — to Sedona Red Rock High School beginning in August.
“Since the start of the season, we’ve continually talked about it. That’s what we’ve been working toward all season,” head baseball coach John Johnson said after a 17-1 win in four innings Tuesday, April 19, at Mayer Elementary School. “With the understanding that it might be Big Park’s last season, the boys have a little bit of extra motivation.”
Head softball coach Shara Coughlin believes the same of her 6-6 Coyotes, even though they have a tougher task, as a fourth seed, to take the championship of their two-day tournament Saturday, April 23, at the Oak Creek School in Cornville.
“It has been a bittersweet year for us,” Coughlin said after also needing just four innings April 19 to shut out Mayer at home, 18-0. “There will always be a Sedona team in the tournament, but there will never again be a Big Park team.”
Both teams have improved their hitting, with Johnson’s team hitting safely 11 times at Mayer, including two inside-the-park home runs by eighth-grader Michael Lagorio which batted in a total of five runs.
“I definitely have some guys that can get on base in front of him,” said Johnson, whose son, Joey, combined with Lagorio and Jake Hobson to strike out 10 Wildcats on the mound. “One of our assets is that we have several players, not just one, with speed.”
Like leadoff hitter Jaiah Grondin and seventh-graders Carlos Parra-Landeverde and first baseman Matt Capozzi — a New Jersey transplant who can, like seven of his teammates, play multiple positions.
“He can pitch, too,” said Johnson, whose team stole 23 bases April 19. “He just catches when our main catcher, Joey, is pitching.”
For Coughlin, eighth-graders Morgan Fritz, Marisela Quidera, Natalie Montgomery and Grace Hafner, who had a solo home run of her own against Mayer, have come through at the plate since the beginning of the season. Others, like infielder Arianna Landeverde and outfielder Nana Sato, have made huge strides.
“She started the season not hitting anybody,” Coughlin said. “Now she averages two hits a game.”
Clarkdale-Jerome School, Big Park’s only baseball loss and the top softball seed, poses the greatest obstacle for both teams, followed by Camp Verde Middle School.
For Big Park and West Sedona School game times, please see the Friday, April 22, issue of the Sedona Red Rock News.
