Rams drop third in row at Silver tourney

SILVER CITY — It was a long weekend for the Portales High baseball team.

The Rams entered Silver High’s Fighting Colt Invitational unbeaten for the season, but finished eighth in the tournament after three consecutive losses.

Portales (6-3), which lost to Cobre in Thursday’s opening round, absorbed a 15-3 setback at the hands of El Paso Cathedral in Friday’s consolation semifinals before falling 11-1 in Saturday’s seventh-place game to St. John, Ariz.

Cathedral took the Rams out of the Friday game with an eight-run sixth. The game ended after six innings on the 10-run rule.

Tyler Rutherford hit a solo homer in the third inning to put the Rams on the board. Portales got its final runs in the bottom of the sixth on RBI singles by Tomas Sotelo and Jordan Obenhaus.

Sotelo and Eric Ornelas both went 2-for-3, including a double for Ornelas. Justin Gilchrist took the loss for Portales, pitching five innings, while Ornelas and Sotelo both pitched in the sixth.

On Saturday, St. John’s opened an 11-0 lead with a seven-run third in a game called after five because of the run rule. The Rams got on the board in the fifth on a single by Rutherford which drove in Jake Leal.

Sammy Hightower pitched the entire game for PHS, allowing eight earned runs. The Rams were guilty of five errors in the field.

PHS returns to action on Monday with a 3 p.m. (MST) doubleheader at Lubbock Christian.