For the Wawasee baseball team, this season has been as much about playing this season as it has winning their first sectional title since 1997.
“Any opportunity to play this year is special,” head coach Brent Doty tells ParkviewSportsMedicine.com. “Especially coming out with a sectional.”
Doty, a 2002 graduate of Wawasee, has coached the baseball team the last 8 seasons; and he serves as the school’s interim athletic director, as well.
“I remember being in middle school and watching that 1997 team play at the regional. I was just a little kid!” Doty admits. “For that to happen this week--and to be commemorated as sectional champion--is special for our guys.”
Left to right: Parker Young, Grant Brooks & Kameron Salazar celebrate
Wawasee's first sectional title in 24 years
The Warriors ran the gauntlet at their host sectional, avenging regular season losses to Lakeland, Jimtown and Northern Lakes Conference champ NorthWood.
Wawasee (18-12) has ridden the ebbs and flows of winning streaks and losing slumps throughout the season, but finds itself peaking at the right time. The Warriors have won seven of their last nine games by an average of 5 runs per contest.
“The team chemistry continues to grow,” senior Kameron Salazar adds. “Early on, we had a good game, then we’d fall off. But we got a feel for each other, and figured it out.”
Salazar has been instrumental both at the plate and on the bump. He is batting a .420 this season, with a home run, 16 RBI and 42 runs scored. In the 39 innings he’s pitched, Salazar has recorded 33 strikeouts with a 3.95 earned run average.
Wawasee's last sectional championship team in 1997
“It trickles down from the top,” Doty adds. Seniors put in the work, and it floats down to the younger guys. They know what it takes to be successful."
Wawasee was one of the 350 Indiana baseball teams to have their season canceled a year ago. In addition to missing the games, the practices and the team comradery, the Warriors feel like they missed the chance to end their quarter-century sectional drought a year early.
“There is a lot of motivation because the seniors [Class of 2020] who left helped build the program,” senior Parker Young says. “The support from the community this season has been more than any other team we’ve played on.” Young averages .347 in his three seasons of varsity baseball; this season, he has 34 hits (17 of them extra base), including 5 home runs.
“Our bond has gotten closer,” junior Grant Brooks adds. “Over the season, we grew in the locker room, at practice and at games.” Brooks’ pitching has been spectacular this season: 6 wins with a 1.38 ERA in 40 ⅔. In the sectional first-round game with Lakeland, he carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning.
Wawasee turns its focus to winning its first-ever regional championship. The Warriors will face Norwell (18-9) in the 3A Regional Semi-Final at 1 p.m. on Saturday, June 5. The winner advances to the regional final against the winner of the 11 a.m. semi-final between #2 Leo and Hamilton Heights. The 3A Bellmont Regional Championship is scheduled for 8 p.m.
Wawasee is one of 26 high schools to partner with Parkview Sports Medicine for athletic training, nutrition, sports performance, athletic rehab and other sports medicine services for Warrior student-athletes. Learn more at www.parkviewsportsmedicine.com.