Arvada West baseball stars shine at Class 5A state championship venue

LAKEWOOD — Arvada West’s baseball team played Saturday on the field it hopes to end its season on.

Keli McGregor Field at Blue Sky All-Star Park will be the venue for the final day of the Class 5A baseball state tournament Saturday, May 30.

“I like this field a lot. We’ve played here a couple of times before,” A-West senior Brayden Reiner said after hitting a pair of home runs in the Wildcats’ 13-0 victory Saturday over Lakewood. “It’s a solid field all the way around.”

The snowstorm that hit Colorado on Friday made it a challenge to get baseball fields ready Saturday morning. A-West was able to move its home game to the all artificial turf Keli McGregor Field in Lakewood.

Colorado Christian University calls All-Star Park home, but the Cougars were playing against Fort Hays University in Kansas this weekend. A few phone calls Friday night to the Gold Crown Foundation and CCU gave the go-head to play the 5A Jeffco League game at All-Star Park.

“This is a great field. A turf field where you can trust your defense even more because you aren’t going to get a bad hop,” A-West junior pitcher Cooper Vais said. “It’s perfect.”

Vais was nearly perfect on the mound against Lakewood. The junior ace threw four shutout innings, allowing just one hit to Tiger senior Eddie Emmitt in the third inning. However, Vais erased Emmitt from first base by picking him off.

The University of Texas commit improved to 6-0 on the mound with a minuscule ERA of 0.24. Vais faced the minimum of 12 Tiger batters through four innings.

“Going into every single outing you have to attack the hitters,” Vais said after his 1-hit shutout performance over four innings of work. “Anything can happen in baseball. You can be playing a bad team, a good team, you still have to attack the hitters and trust your defense.”

With A-West (12-3, 5-0 in league) holding a 13-0 lead heading to the bottom of the fifth inning, senior Kellen Conley relieved Vais on the mound. Conley got three quick outs to end the game with the 10-run mercy rule after 5 innings.

The one-two starting pitching punch of Vais and Reiner have pitched almost 53 innings so far this season with the Wildcats on a current 10-game winning streak. A-West’s lone losses came at the Boras Classic in Arizona.

“The biggest thing with Cooper and Brayden is they are attacking the zone early and really trying to force swings early,” A-West coach Danny Vais said. “Obviously, Cooper has electric stuff and overpowers batters at times, but we want to get swings early. That was the one big adjustment from the RV game.”

Vais gave up three unearned runs against rival Ralston Valley to open conference play on April 9. The junior was much sharper against the Tigers (2-13, 0-5) striking out nine batters.

Offensively, Reiner led off the first and third innings with solo home runs off Lakewood starting pitcher Ayden Muniz, who used a lot of off-speed to try to keep the Wildcats’ potent offense in check. It didn’t work against Reiner who hit his first two home runs of the season.

“The first one it kind of got in on my hands,” Reiner said of his first solo shot. “The ball had a lot of backspin and kept on carrying. That is what carried it out.”

The second home run was a line-drive shot that just had enough hight to clear the field in right field, again.

“Today my focus was to keep my body relaxed, stay behind the ball and let it come to me,” Reiner said. “That really worked.”

Reiner did pay for the solo home runs. The A-West catcher took a foul ball off his right knee.

“It’s a little swollen right there,” Reiner said of his right knee that took a foul ball while he was catching early in the game. “I felt like an old man most of the time squatting into my crouch.”

The Wildcats ended up with nine hits in the 13-run outburst. Senior Beau Friesen had a 3-RBI game. Senior Levi Lueck scored three runs. Junior Jeramiah Gonzales was 2-for-2 with a pair of RBIs. Coach Vais was able put in five pinch-hitters in the bottom of the fourth inning to get some plate appearances for his bench players.

A-West is on a 10-game winning streak and No. 1 in the 5A Baseball CHSAA Selection & Seeding Index.

“That is what I like about our team. We call ourselves the African wild dogs,” Coach Vais said. “They are the most lethal hunters on Earth and it takes a bunch of them to be able to win a game.”

A-West has a 1-game lead over Valor Christian (8-7,4-1) and Chatfield (8-8, 4-1) in the conference standings. The Wildcats are at Lakewood High School on Tuesday, April 21, to finish off the 2-game series against the Tigers.