A true underdog story: How Owyhee baseball surprised everyone to win a 5A state title
The traditional powers stood atop the preseason rankings in Idaho 5A high school baseball. But the year ended with an out-of-nowhere champion.
Owyhee wrapped up its first season with a 6-0 victory over Rocky Mountain in the 5A state championship game Saturday at Wolfe Field in Caldwell, capping an improbable run for the first-year program.
“We didn’t have any expectations,” Owyhee senior Drayton Black said. “We had nothing to lose. So we came out here and just gave it all we had. All you’ve got to do is believe, and we believed.”
That belief was hard to find in March. The Storm (20-9) finished eighth out of 12 teams in a 5A SIC preseason coaches’ poll. Owyhee coach Russ Wright said this week a .500 season would have satisfied him. And several players admitted making it to state stood as their wildest dream.
Winning a title never crossed anyone’s mind.
“I’m speechless. I can’t believe it,” Owyhee junior shortstop Cole Rohlmeier said. “We’ve been training so hard since the winter. To get to this level from districts, I don’t even know. It’s just incredible.”
Owyhee finished third at last week’s district tournament, but it still flew under the radar at state, drawing the fifth seed. Two come-from-behind victories over Lewiston and No. 1 Mountain View propelled it into the championship, where the Storm left no doubt.
Black and Jack Ryan combined to throw a seven-hit shutout, shutting down a Rocky Mountain lineup that posted 19 runs in the opening two rounds.
The outing made for a dream ending for Black, who chose to join the team as its lone senior. The West Ada School District’s new school boundaries didn’t affect him. He voluntarily left a loaded Mountain View team to start something new at Owyhee.
The gamble paid off with a history-making championship.
“That’s as good as he’s thrown all year,” Wright said. “He elevated that start to a level where it was his best outing of the year.”
Owyhee took advantage of, and forced, several miscues from No. 2 Rocky Mountain (22-7). Rohlmeier scored on a wild pitch and Ryan came home on an error in the third inning to open a 2-0 lead.
The Storm then broke the game open in the top of the seventh, using three Rocky Mountain errors and some timely hitting to plate four runs and capture Wright his ninth state championship.
Wright won the first eight state titles with Fruitland’s baseball program. His coaching days appeared over three years ago, when he resigned and became the school’s athletic director.
Wright hesitated to apply for the open position at West Ada’s newest high school. What would they want with a 59-year-old, he figured. But Wright said his wife, Andrea, convinced him to go for it.
“She said you’re not as happy as you were when I watched you coach,” said Wright, who still commutes from Fruitland each day. “So, I mean, this is her fault.”
Wright inherited a blank canvas. Rohlmeier was the only player with significant varsity experience. Then he broke his wrist in early April and missed a month.
That led Owyhee to an underwhelming start. Iit split its first 10 conference games, ensuring a fifth-place finish in the 5A SIC standings. But a roster full of underclassmen found its groove in late April to make a Cinderella run.
Saturday’s victory marked Owyhee’s seventh in a row, and its 10th in its final 11 games of the year.
“The magic is in the kids,” Wright said. “They’re the ones that make choices. They’re the ones that make decisions about how hard they want to go, how hard they want to be coached.
“... For them to all come together and do that in their first year, that’s unbelievable.”
And with Black as the only senior on the team, Saturday’s title may not be the last for Owyhee.
“This is just the beginning,” Rohlmeier said. “Next year, everyone better watch out. We might go back-to-back.”
HOW RARE ARE FIRST-YEAR TITLES?
In baseball, not as rare as you’d think.
Timberline won a 5A state championship in its first season in 1999. And Columbia won a 4A title during its inaugural season in 2007.
That makes Owyhee the third of the six most recent 5A and 4A schools built in the Treasure Valley to capture a baseball state championship trophy in Year 1.
Owyhee follows in the footsteps of its boys basketball program, which also won a state title in its first season. But that team started the year as the clear favorite in the 5A SIC and was never ranked lower than third in the state media poll all season.
Owyhee’s softball team also reached the 5A championship game Saturday before falling to Skyview. Unlike the Storm baseball team, it also started the year as one of the favorites in the 5A SIC, finishing third in a preseason poll.
5A STATE TOURNAMENT
Timberline 10, Mountain View 1: Jaydn Volk led the Wolves to the third-place trophy, holding No. 1 Mountain View to one run on four hits through six innings.
Defending state champ Timberline (22-5) scored nine unanswered runs after the second inning to pull away. Dominic Iglesias led the way, driving in three runs. Kailer Saunders and Owen Payn each had two hits.
Ian Tippetts went 3-for-3 with an RBI for Mountain View (22-5).
Lewiston 5, Borah 4: Cruz Hepburn cranked a walk-off home run to left field in the bottom of the 10th inning to lift the Bengals (23-6) to the consolation title.
Borah (17-13) was led by Lance Anderson, who went 2-for-4 with two RBIs.
This story was originally published May 21, 2022 at 10:11 PM.
