Bear Down Wildcats

What if I told you that Tucson has a baseball team that has won 49 of its last 50 games?

And what if I told you that team has outscored its opponents 383 to 49 this season?

Or if I told you it has a player who hit .636? Yes, .636. Have you ever seen a .600 hitter in baseball?

Desert Christian High School’s baseball team is like the introduction to an ESPN “30 for 30” documentary. The “what ifs” are fact, not baseball fiction.

What if I told you that the Eagles have a pitcher who has not yielded an earned run in 44 innings? That’s an ERA of 0.00, with 92 strikeouts.

And what if I told you that the Desert Christian players actually built their own ballpark, and that it is a little piece of paradise with up-close views of the Rincon and Catalina mountains? Or that between pitches you can hear horses whinny from a ranch adjacent to the third base dugout?

It’s all true.

The Eagles are 27-1 this year and twice this week, in back-to-back days, pitched no-hitters against overmatched opponents.

A lot of people might scoff that Desert Christian is a 1A school that plays in Division IV. The school has just 160 students, but coach Grant Hopkins’ team this year has whipped bigger schools Flowing Wells, Pueblo, Douglas, Walden Grove, Yuma Cibola, Glendale Apollo and teams from Idaho and New Mexico.

“People have told me that we must have recruited our players,” Hopkins said. “But it costs about $10,000 a year to attend Desert Christian. So, no, there’s no recruiting. Not possible.”

Monday was Senior Day at Desert Christian and at the conclusion of a 22-1 victory over the Arizona Lutheran Academy of Phoenix, the Eagles’ four seniors and their parents marched to home plate and were presented with bouquets of roses.

A crowd of about 200 people gave them a sustained ovation. It might be the most productive senior class in the history of Arizona high school baseball. That’s not an exaggeration; the four have gone 101-16 and are working on a third consecutive state championship.

Senior first baseman-pitcher Zach Malis is hitting .583 with 56 RBIs. An angular lefty, Malis has already gone 9 for 9 in two games this week. He hit .636 a year ago and holds more Arizona high school baseball records than anyone ever. Ever.

Senior lefty pitcher Andrew Edwards is 8-0 and has not yielded an earned run in 44 innings. Central Arizona College has offered him a scholarship and scouts have timed his fastball at 89 mph. And he’s hitting .464 with 42 RBIs.

Senior shortstop Camron White is hitting .452 with 41 RBIs. Not that anyone is surprised: White hit .548 as a sophomore.

Senior cleanup hitter Ryan Phillips is hitting .470 with 39 RBIs. As a sophomore, he went 2 for 5 and drove in three runs in the state championship game.

“Regardless of classifications, I think we’re one of the best teams in Tucson,” Hopkins said. “I don’t know how many teams have difference-makers like Malis and Edwards.”

There is a bit of serendipity involved. Malis planned to attend Sabino High School but after the first two weeks of the 2011-12 school year, transferred to Desert Christian.

“We get whoever walks through he door,” Hopkins said. “When Zach walked through the door, he became the X-factor.”

In the modern era of smaller-school Arizona high school baseball, Joseph City’s Wally Pate, Willcox’s Ryno Bethel and St. David’s Troy Bradford dominated the way Malis dominates at Desert Christian.

Pate went on to play at Yavapai College. Bethel played at Grand Canyon and in the Tampa Bay Rays’ farm system. Bradford was an All-Pac-10 player at Arizona.

Malis, who has chosen to play at Grand Canyon, now owns state career records — all — for RBIs (209), runs (200) and hits (208). His 1A Conference career batting average, .552, is a fraction ahead of Pate’s career .551, set from 1977-80. Beyond that, Malis’ state records for a season, both within 1A and for all levels, would require several more paragraphs. And he is 20-1 as a pitcher the last two seasons.

“I give them credit, they don’t rub it in when they beat you, they’re good guys,” said Jay Gonzales, a former baseball and softball coach at The Gregory School. “They go eight deep. Usually at the 1A level, if you go four deep, you’re a state contender.”

Desert Christian has won games 33-1, 32-0, 28-0 and 27-0 this season, but it’s not like the Eagles are unfeeling. On Monday, Hopkins emptied his bench in the third inning, replacing his four seniors.

“When they get up by 10 runs, they stop stealing bases, things like that,” Gonzales said. “They do it the right way.”

Hopkins, who played for Desert Christian in the late 1980s, is a stockbroker by day and a baseball coach by afternoon and night. He has studied the history books; he knows that no Tucson team has won three consecutive state baseball titles since the 1954-56 Tucson High Badgers.

It motivates him; his team is four victories away from joining that elite list.

“People say, ‘Why don’t you move up a class, to 2A or 3A?’” he says. “Well, we don’t have enough players for a junior varsity team. Last year we really only had 10 players.”

Next year, the Arizona Interscholastic Association will move Desert Christian’s baseball program up a class and add another division, putting them in a league opposite Amphi, Catalina, Pueblo and other much larger schools.

But that’s a story for another day. On Monday, as his team took an 11-0 lead in the first inning, Malis stepped into the batter’s box as the PA system played MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This.”

Malis lined a triple off the fence.

Can’t touch this, indeed.

Desert Christian assistant baseball coach Ryan Hanson, an instrumental part in the team’s run to a state title last spring, died unexpectedly Wednesday. He was 34.

The cause of death is unknown, and an autopsy will be performed within the next few days.

Ryan Hanson and his father, Mike, came to Desert Christian from Canyon del Oro before last season and helped the Eagles go 26-4 and win the Division IV state championship, their first in school history. They were also assistant coaches on CDO’s state championship team in 2009.

“It’s very tough,” coach Grant Hopkins said. “Without Mike and Ryan there’s no way we would have won last year. They brought a different level to our program.”

Ryan Hanson was a member of Sabino’s 1997 state championship team alongside current Sabercats coach Kelly Johnson who said Hanson had an incredible passion for coaching and helping kids get better.

“I think he had a very positive impact because he taught the game the right way, to be played hard,” Johnson said. “He drove the force that you’re going to play as a team and win as a team.”

Johnson described Ryan Hanson and his father as “best friends,” and said he was still in disbelief of the sudden death. The father-son combo was present for Desert Christian’s 8-2 win against Pusch Ridge Christian on Saturday, but Ryan Hanson suddenly fell ill after that. Neither was at practice Monday, and they both missed the team’s game Tuesday at Tanque Verde, something that was surprising to Hopkins.

“He was like Iron Man,” Hopkins said about Ryan Hanson. “He never missed anything.”

Mike Hanson found Ryan unresponsive Wednesday at their home before the Eagles played at Tombstone, Hopkins said. Hanson called Hopkins to tell him the news, and he didn’t tell the team until after the game.

Desert Christian is off to a 16-2 start and is ranked No. 1 in Division IV. Its next game is Saturday at 10 a.m. when it hosts Phoenix Country Day.

“They guys are distraught, and they’re trying to process it,” Hopkins said. “Most of these kids have never lost anybody before; this might be the first tragedy they’ve experienced.”

Desert Christian baseball breezes to Division IV championship with win over Ray

Jose M. Romero, 1:34 p.m. MST May 17, 2015

For Ray's baseball team, there was no hitting Desert Christian starting pitcher Andrew Edwards. Not for five innings, anyway.

Edwards held upset-minded Ray hitless until the sixth, and a disastrous defensive inning for Ray helped top-seeded Desert Christian win its third consecutive Division IV state championship with a 13-6 victory Saturday night at Maryvale Baseball Park.

Edwards was on his game for the most part, striking out 13 and walking five over the 5 2/3 innings total he pitched. Edwards struck out the side three times, pumping his first with No. 13 to end the top of the fifth.

But things almost fell completely apart in the sixth when Ray rallied for six runs off Edwards. Desert Christian turned to Zach Malis in relief with two out and four runs in, and Douglas McPeak doubled in two more to make it a two-run game. Malis struck out Derek Pacheco to end the inning.

Edwards said all was forgotten in the celebration of another title.

"Our main focus was to let whatever happens happen, and I think I did that," Edwards said. "When it boils down to it, that's all it is, it's just another baseball game. Just come out here and be myself and stay within myself."

Camron White broke a scoreless tie in the bottom of the third inning with a run-scoring single, and Desert Christian scored five runs in the frame thanks in large part to four Ray errors.

White's hit drove in Zach Rosson, who led off the inning with a double. White then stole third base and raced home on a throwing error, then Malis drove a ground-rule double that one-hopped the wall in left-center field.

Malis stole third base and scored on another throwing error. Two more runs scored with two out on a three-base error that allowed Jacob Rosson to reach.

Desert Christian rolled through the playoff bracket, scoring double digits in runs in all three games leading up to Saturday night. No opponent scored more than two runs and Desert Christian won all three games by at least nine runs.

Saturday was the closest game it had by far, even though Desert Christian led 8-0 going into the sixth.

Ray put runners on base via walks in the top of the third, and those runners took second and third bases on a wild pickoff throw to second base from Edwards. The Desert Christian infield was shifting to cover a possible bunt, and the timing was off on the throw.

But Edwards buckled down, survived a line drive down the left field line that went foul by a few feet and retired the next two Ray hitters on strikeouts.

Ray's Seth Harmon broke up Edwards' bid for a no-hitter in the top of the sixth with a bunt single to load the bases. The shutout was lost one batter later when Jacob Pace hit what appeared to be a double-play ball, but turned into a throwing error that allowed a second run to score.

Ray scored twice more in wild fashion, a triple and throwing error allowing Jordan Pace to drive in one and score himself, followed by McPeak's double.

Desert Christian scored five runs in the bottom of the sixth on another throwing error on an attempted double play followed by Zach Rosson's two-run single and an RBI single from Malis. A botched attempt to throw out Malis attempting to steal allowed another run to score.

That sealed it for Desert Christian. Ray committed five errors for the game, Desert Christian four.

Malis was able to finish the game with a scoreless seventh.

"The last three years, anytime there has been any adversity, they've come back," head coach Grant Hopkins said. "They've battled and they've been successful.

"Tucson has a three-peat champion, that's what it means to me. These guys are like my sons to me, I'm so proud of them," Hopkins added.

Desert Christian tacked on three more runs in the bottom of the fifth on a single, walk, sacrifice, infield hit by Jacob Rosson to drive in the first run, stolen base and wild pitch. Ray reliever Destry Yocum walked in the third run of the inning, the fourth of four bases on balls he issued in the inning.

Desert Christian went 26-4 in 2013 and 29-2 when they dedicated the championship run to Ryan Hanson last year. Free from dedications to their school and from the heartbreak of a lost coach, the Eagles have posted and incredible 31-1 record this spring.

The Eagles have not lost to a team from Arizona since Apr. 22, 2013 and have remained undefeated in their division since Feb. 27 of that year. As for teams from Southern Arizona with three state championships in a row, Willcox won in 1999, 2000 and 2001 and St. David won three from 2000 to 2002.

Tucson High was the last team from the Tucson area to complete the task but you would have to go all the way back to 1954 to 1956.