No. 2 Pirates clinch district title

By Santiago Ramos Jr. 
Special to the Times

GRANTS, N.M.

Class 4A No. 2 ranked Grants downed top ranked St. Pius X 17-10 Tuesday afternoon in a crucial District 5-4A baseball showdown.

With the key district win, Grants (19-5, 6-0 in district) clinched the District 5-4A title.

For Grants it was its fourth district title ever with the last one in 1985 along with titles in 1976 and 1979.

First-year Pirate head coach Mike Furbee said he was surprised that his team was able to clinch the district title with two district games remaining.

“We were not expecting that type of high-scoring game but we were ready with all my pitchers available,” Furbee said. “It feels good to get the district championship wrapped up early. Now we can start to get ready for the state tournament.

“We got off to a rough start but was able to answer their big innings with big innings of our own,” Furbee added. “Niko Young did a great job of coming into pitch in the third inning and really settling things down.”

It was a high-scoring affair for the first three innings.

St. Pius (15-5, 3-3) trailed Grants 9-8 after two innings. The Sartans added a single run in the third but the Pirates broke through for five more runs in the bottom of the third to take the lead for good, 14-9.

Grants put the game away with three more runs in the fourth to go ahead 17-9. St. Pius scored its final run in the fifth but could not overcome the seven-run deficit.

Grants’ leading hitters were senior leftfielder Nick Bustos who went 3-for-5 with three doubles and four RBIs and sophomore centerfielder Boudy Melonas who was 2-for-4 with five RBIs.

Senior first baseman Gabriel Marquez was 2-for-4 with two RBIs and freshman second baseman Estevan Barela was 1-for-1 with two walks and two RBIs. Senior catcher
Andres Lopez went 3-for-4 with two doubles and sophomore shortstop/pitcher Dominick Gonzales was 2-for-4 with one RBI.

Grants outhit St. Pius 15 to 8.

Young picked up the win in relief going four innings and allowing four hits, two earned runs with two strikeouts and six walks. Junior starting pitcher Izeyah Manzanares lasted two innings and gave up eight runs, two earned runs on four hits. Gonzales got the save as he closed out the game and pitched the seventh and allowed no hits and no runs striking out one and walking one.

The Pirates knocked off the Sartans 10-9 two weeks ago for the first time since 2016.

Grants will play at Highland Friday before entertaining Belen Tuesday in the season finale before state. The Pirates crushed Highland 19-1 earlier and downed Belen 10-4.

Despite having beaten No. 1 St. Pius in the first meeting, the No. 2 Pirates are still ranked behind the No. 1 Sartans in Class 4A in the state, based on Pius having played a higher strength of schedule over Grants.

“The state standings are sometimes hard to figure out,” Furbee said. “We’ll let the season play out before we start to focus on potential first round matchups.”
Grants has boasted a young but tough pitching staff with junior Izeyah Manzanares, sophomore Dominick Gonzales, freshman Estevan Barela and sophomore Niko Young.

The Pirates have the top three district pitchers with Manzanares and Gonzales both sporting impressive 0.00 ERAs in leading the district pitching stats while Barela has an outstanding 1.35 ERA to rank third.

“They’re the pitchers we lead on,” Furbee said. “We use them based on the best matchup.”

Gonzales and Manzanares along with senior Andres Lopez and senior Gabriel Marquez are leading the team at the plate.

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