State baseball: Henry Sibley goes from last in con – TwinCities.com-Pioneer Press

Sibley junior Joe Ihrke didn’t mince words when discussing his team’s mind-set when the Warriors were 4-14 with two games to play in the regular season.

“We were ready for the season to be over,” Ihrke said.

But prior to sections, senior Max Buell said assistant coach Shawn Peck told the team it had two options.

“We could either end an awful season,” Buell said, “or we could try to turn it around and make it something special.”

Sibley (15-15) chose the latter, proceeding to win 11 of its last 12 games capped by an 8-4 victory over Mahtomedi in the Class 3A championship game on Monday night at Target Field. The unseeded Warriors knocked off the tournament’s top three seeds on their way to the title.

“It’s been a lot of fun,” Buell said. “Every game we just kind of played to play the next day, and we kept winning. It’s unbelievable, I think.”

There’s no simple answer for a turnaround like the one the Warriors experienced. But junior Sam Essen provided a few explanations.

He credited Sibley’s close losses throughout the season – the Warriors went 2-7 in one-run games – for teaching the team a lesson.

“We realized maybe we’re not as good as we thought, maybe we need to bond together and go about our business in a different way,” Essen said. “We committed to each other and committed to the team and ourselves, and it worked out.”

That change was most evident at the plate. Previously, Essen said, the Warriors attempted to have heroic at-bats. Now Sibley simply tries to string quality at-bats together.

The approach paid off. Twice during sections,Sibley scored 20-plus runs in a single game, and the Warriors pounded out 10 hits Monday.

“We were getting really hot, with some bloop hits here and there,” Ihrke said. “We couldn’t catch a break earlier in the season, and now we’re catching breaks. It’s a good time to catch them.”

A few of those breaks came in the form of Mahtomedi errors. The top-seeded Zephyrs (21-6) committed three of them, including two in a four-run third inning for Sibley.

“It sure swung things a little bit,” Mahtomedi coach John Hardgrove said. “It’s what we haven’t characteristically done for a long time. … It gave them some runs, and we just had too much to overcome.”

Senior Trevor Moses hit a home run to left field to cut Mahtomedi’s deficit to 6-3 in the fourth inning, but that was one of few highlights for the Zephyrs.

Monday’s result was a 180 from the team’s previous two meetings. Mahtomedi outscored Sibley by a total score of 21-7 during the regular season on its way to the Metro East Conference title. Sibley finished last in the conference.

But, come Monday, Essen said the Warriors were a different team.

“We knew we could go toe to toe with them,” Essen said. “We knew we could play with them.”

The previous record for most losses by a state baseball champion was 11 by Coon Rapids in 2008. Sibley smashed that mark. Monday’s win pushed the Warriors to .500, something they celebrated when it was announced after the game.

“We’re proud of it,” Essen said. “It shows how far we’ve come and it shows anything’s possible. We’re not going to shy away from it. It’s who we were, but we’re a different team than what we used to be. We’re a better team now.”

At the state banquet prior to the tournament, Essen remembers teams talking about their seasons, with mentions of how they’d won 15 straight games or captured their third straight conference title.

“We walk up and we’re like ‘We went 2-14 in our conference,’ ” Essen said. “We’re a bunch of boys from Mendota Heights who just got hot.”

And didn’t quit. Sibley coach Greg Fehrman said the Warriors’ run showed something about his players.

“Their character speaks for them,” Fehrman said. “The way they went about doing this, it’s pretty obvious they persevered. They’re kids that just wanted to get better and play baseball.”

Fehrman hopes Sibley’s story provides hope for future teams that experience early struggles.

“They can use it as a reference point and say ‘Hey, we could do the same thing,’ ” Fehrman said.

Maybe, though a run as improbable as Sibley’s doesn’t come around often.

“It’s awesome,” Ihrke said. “Highlight of my life so far.”

Briefly

All-tournament team: Benilde-St. Margaret’s – Jack Qualen and Derek Drees. Sibley – Charley Hesse, Sam Gantman and Joe Ihrke. Little Falls – Austin Jenks and Thomas Miller. Mahtomedi – Trevor Moses, Kyle Hinseth and Mitch Nordin. New Ulm – Cooper Yackley. Northfield – Nic Zabel.