Bear River Giants outlast SFLL Giants;

Capture TOC Area II crown

Front Row: David Hempe, Mac Slane, Chris Lopez, Michael Raigoza, Kyle Soria, Tyler Toft, Manager James Toft Back Row: Coach Jess Soria, Josh Toft, Justin Brown, David Keaton, Brandon Bump, Coach Dahrol Ennis, Kyle Vandervort, Nick Medenwald

It was a tale of “Last Man Standing” Tuesday night at Bear River Little League Park.

In an epic of a championship game that will be talked about for seasons to come, the host Bear River Giants “never said die” and pulled out an amazing 15-14 seven-inning win over the Sierra Foothill League Giants to capture the District 11 Area II Tournament of Champions title.

“The kids wouldn’t quit,” said manager James Toft of the Bear River Giants. “The Sierra Foothills team has some outstanding hitters but our kids just kept coming back. I’m real proud of them.”

The win for the BRLL Giants now vaults the Nevada County team into a best two of three series against the Area I champions (either Rocklin or Tri-City) to decide the District 11 championship.

Game One of that series will be played at Bear River on Thursday starting at 7 p.m. Game Two is slated for Friday at Lincoln also at 7 p.m.

A third game if necessary would be played on Saturday back at Bear River also at 7 p.m.

In Tuesday’s win, the BRLL Giants broke out to an early lead but fell behind after the Colfax area visitors proceeded to unload three home runs on the night.

Sierra Foothill Colfax started the scoring in top of the first with 3 runs while Bear River started strong at the plate also with 6 runs in the bottom half of the first.  The runs continued in the 2nd with Sierra Foothill scoring 2 more runs from a 2-run homer by Matt Paskey.  

The Bear River Giants answered in the bottom half of the 2nd with 5 runs to lead 11-5 after two innings. The Sierra Foothill Giants added 2 more runs in the 3rd with one of the runs coming from a solo HR from Roger Lille.  

The Bear River Giants scored one run off a triple by Josh Toft in the bottom of the 3rd and he scored on a throwing error.  The Bear River Giants were then held scoreless for the next three innings while Sierra Foothill Giants scored 4 in the 4th inning and one more in the 5th inning to make the score 12-12 after six innings.

Great defensive plays by the Sierra Foothill Giants in the bottom of the sixth inning put the game in extra innings - the second and third outs of the inning were thrown outs at home plate.

Matt Paskey hit his second HR on the night to lead off the Sierra Foothill Giants in the top of the 7th inning.  Sierra Foothill scored one more run to take a 14-12 lead going to the bottom of the seventh inning. The Bear River Giants fought back in the bottom of the seventh with 4 hits and 3 runs scored to win the game 15-14.  Chris Lopez was up to bat with 2 outs based loaded game tied 14-14, count of 1 ball 2 strikes, hit a single up the middle to score David Keaton to win the game.