Texico wins first two of Colt Classic

ROSWELL — Coaches will often say pitching wins games and titles. The first was certainly true for Texico in its first two games of this weekend’s Colt Classic at New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell.

Dalton Thatcher fired a no-hitter in Friday’s 6-0 win over Shiprock, coming an early team error from a perfect game, with an outing fueled by nine strikeouts and no walks. A day earlier, Luke Phipps tossed a two-hitter, including 11 strikeouts and no walks. The only run to score against Phipps was unearned.

Two games, two wins, two total hits allowed, 20 total strikeouts, no walks, no earned runs. Not a bad couple of games for the green and white.

“We still had some mistakes, just a few base-running errors here and there, things we’ve got to do a little better,” Texico head coach Ty Thatcher said. “But we got two good pitching performances from Luke and Dalton; I’m excited about the way they performed. Got ’em some run support, which always helps.”

Even so, Texico’s baseball team — like any during late March — is still coming along. Every game, every tournament brings with it a challenge that when risen to brings improvement.

The Wolverines met some challenges and showed some improvement during the weekend’s tournament. They played and beat solid competition, pushed their way from under to over the .500 mark with a pair of six-run wins.

Thursday’s 7-1 opening-round victory over Dexter was followed by Friday’s 6-0 victory over Shiprock, moving the Wolverines to 3-2 on the season as they headed into Saturday night’s tournament championship game against Capitan.

“The kids have been pretty resilient and played some pretty good baseball against some quality teams,” Ty Thatcher said. “(Beating) teams that are in the 4A classification always makes it better.”

Texico began with a small school, though, battling Dexter Thursday night. The Wolverines had a modest 1-0 lead heading into the top of the fourth inning, when they plated four to build a more comfortable advantage. Seth Griego’s RBI double was the biggest knock during that half-inning.

Cole Rohrbach wielded the biggest stick in Thursday’s contest, going 3-for-4 with a triple and two RBIs.

Phipps was 2-for-3; Dalton Thatcher and Griego were each 2-for-4. Griego, Cian Holmes and Robin Winton had one double apiece.

Then on Friday came Dalton Thatcher’s masterpiece.

It wasn’t like fans were on the edges of their seats, wondering if Thatcher would toss the perfect game. A booted ball on Shiprock’s first at-bat quickly eliminated any chance of that. But Thatcher was perfect from then on, and could pitch without jitters with a perfecto off the table so soon.

“I guess, yeah,” Ty Thatcher said. “He threw well, though. He had command.”

How much command? The younger Thatcher needed just 73 pitches, 55 of which were strikes, to throw his complete-game no-hitter.

“So a pretty impressive performance on the mound,” Ty Thatcher said. “They’ve got some guys that can play, but Dalton controlled the tempo all day and kept them off balance.”

He also had a two-run triple to fuel a four-run seventh inning that broke the game open, stretching Texico’s lead from 2-0 to 6-0.

Ruger Horton had given the Wolverines that early lead in the top of the fourth by clouting a two-run double. With Texico runners on second and third, Horton came through by belting his double on a full count.

Rohrbach also had a good game against Shiprock, going 2-for-3 with an RBI.

Texico’s Saturday-night championship game against Capitan was scheduled for a 6:30 p.m. start.