McGuinness sets early pace in Bowman

With the Bo Bowman Invitational Baseball Classic comes the usual rain showers but this year the showers were more like constant drizzle that failed to really disrupt the first day of action and give hope for tournament officials that the event will be able to wind up Saturday.

One thing appears certain, Bishop McGuinness is the favorite and the 17-0 rout the the Irish slapped on Fletcher pretty much showed that would be the toughest team in the field.

There were some other interesting subplots including Apache taking a 5-4 victory from the host Wolverines. Apache is coached by Larry Pahcoddy who left the LHS job and is now coaching the Warriors.

“Any win is a big win for us at this time of the season,” Pahcody said. “We have a bunch of young players and we are just learning to get better and find ways to win.”

“Thursday, we got a big effort from Stetson Hix who had a two-run double that helped us get a couple of run against them,” Pahcoddy said. “He also comes in there in the last inning and gets the final out for us.”

Cache got off to a good start with two wins, one of those coming on a seven-inning effort on the mound by Canden Hance.

“The good thing about these tournament is that it gives us a chance to get good innings for our younger guys,” Cache head Coach Danny Lee said. “With these district doubleheaders on Monday and Tuesday, it makes it hard to play in tournaments and use your best pitchers. You have to save your best for district games. In our case we have Plainview Monday and Tuesday and they have a good bunch. It just depends on who you play right after these tournaments.

The final game at Ike Thursday has MacArthur beating Walters which will move the Highlanders into a 5:30 game at Lawton High against Cache.

There were still three more games on tap later Thursday at LHS.