Roller coaster ride for Feather River baseball

These past two weeks have been quite a roller coaster ride for the Feather River College baseball team.

Oh, but what a thrill it's been because the Golden Eagles have flown to a new level. All the way to the California Community College Final Four this weekend in Fresno, Calif.

Feather River (36-10) -- located in Quincy, Calif., but a program with plenty of local flavor -- plays in the double elimination Final Four tournament Saturday through Monday.

As for that local flavor, the team roster includes Carson High graduate Tim Priess, Tyler Selden from Fernley, Byron Cragg from Galena and Cal Lewis from Douglas. Pitching coach Gabe Zappin is another Carson High product. Head coach Jedd Soto, who has led the program since its inception in 1998, is a graduate of Reed High and formerly played with the Carson Capitols summer program.

Don't be surprised if Soto and the rest of the Golden Eagles are pinching themselves right now, especially after coming back from the brink of elimination each of the last two weekends.

First, they got through the opening round of the state playoffs on a bizarre turn of events that involved a protest and resulted in Santa Rosa forfeiting the final game of the four-team double elimination regional tournament in Quincy.

Santa Rosa came out of the loser's bracket and beat Feather River 4-3 on Sunday, May 11, and the problem began when a Santa Rosa player was ejected for arguing a called strike-three with the plate umpire in the ninth inning. According to college rules, any ejection carries a one-game suspension. However, after a pregame discussion with umpires and the tournament administrator, Santa Rosa coach Ron Myers wrote the player -- the team's leading hitter -- into the lineup for the final, which the Bear Cubs went on to win, 12-4.

"I asked the umpire for a ruling and he told me, 'If I had to write it down now, it wouldn't be an ejection,'" Myers told the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.

Feather River's season appeared to be over, except an appeal filed with the Commission on Athletics resulted in a decision that the two teams would have to play an additional game -- without the ineligible player -- to settle the matter. The teams were scheduled to play on a neutral site, American River College in Sacramento, on May 14. The game was never played because the Santa Rosa team voted not to play, awarding a forfeit and sending Feather River to the Super Regionals and a date at home against Sacramento City -- an old nemesis.

Sacramento City ended Feather River's season each of the last two seasons, including a ninth inning rally that decided the final game in the 2002 regionals. The Golden Eagles were in trouble again after losing the opening game of the best-of-three series on Friday 18-9 and trailing 10-4 after seven innings on Saturday.

But then, that roller coaster ride took another turn.

Feather River rallied to score four runs in the eighth inning and three more runs in the ninth to tie the score 12-12 and eventually won the game 14-12 in 10 innings. Reed High graduate Travis Bartek hit 4-for-7 with two home runs and five RBIs, and in the end, Cragg pitched two shutout innings in relief to pick up the win.

That wasn't the end of the excitement, by any means.

Feather River won the series finale on Sunday, 5-2, after Cragg came back out of the bullpen and retired the last two batters to end a Sacramento City rally in the top of the ninth.

The Golden Eagles, the No. 4 seeded team from Northern California, open in the double elimination Final Four tournament Saturday at 6 p.m. at John Euless Ballpark against Cypress College, the No. 1 seed from Southern California. San Mateo, the North's No. 1 seed, plays Saddleback, No. 7 from the South, at noon in the other first-round contest. Play continues on Sunday and the championship game will be played on Monday.

Dave Price is a sports writer for the Nevada Appeal