State baseball: Pacheco powers Demons’ rally to defeat Ravens in Game 1

James Barron | The New Mexican

5/16/2008 - 5/17/08

All Richard Pacheco used was muscle.

All Herbie Romero brought was guts.

It was enough for the eighth-seeded Santa Fe High baseball team to escape its opening-round game of the Class AAAAA State Tournament with an 11-10 win over No. 9 Albuquerque Rio Grande at Santa Fe High's baseball field Friday afternoon.

The Demons (19-8) can close out the best-of-three series with a win in today's doubleheader and reach the AAAAA quarterfinals in Albuquerque next week. They can thank Pacheco, the junior designated hitter, for putting them in that position.

Pacheco was 0-for-3 with two strikeouts when he stepped to the plate with the bases loaded and two outs in the sixth inning with the Ravens holding a 10-8 lead.

He was helped by a passed ball from Ravens catcher Andrew Silva, which allowed Andy Hyde to score from third base for 10-9.

On the very next pitch, Pacheco muscled a fastball from Rio Grande pitcher Oscar Almeida. The pitch was on the bat handle, but flared up the middle to drive in Josh Garcia and
A.J. Trujillo for an 11-10 lead.

It capped a six-run rally in the frame to wipe clean what was a 10-5 Ravens' advantage.

Not too bad for a player that Demons head coach John Morrison says has more RBIs than hits, although he doesn't know the exact total.

"He continues to have big hits, big RBIs in the late innings," Morrison says. "He produces late in games, so we hope he can continue to do that."

Pacheco credited the offseason conditioning for the football team, of which he is a quarterback, for giving him the requisite strength to pull off the feat.

"I've gotten way better (strength-wise)," Pacheco said. "That's all that hit was."

But the physical strength of one teammate emboldened the inner strength of another in Romero. The left-handed senior, who went 7-0 in the regular season, looked anything like an ace. He consistently fell behind in the count, his curveball was erratic and he left pitches up in the strike zone.

Still, the Ravens (16-11) couldn't put a dent in the scoreboard until the third. Then came two singles, two doubles and two home runs led to seven runs.

Josh Robles' solo homer over the right field fence opened the third, and Silva handed Rio Grande a 3-2 lead with a two-run blast three batters later.

In the fourth, a pair of solo home runs from Almeida and Carlos Correa made it 9-4, but Romero persevered. He regained control of his breaking pitch and allowed one hit and a walk over the final 22/3 innings to improve to 8-0.

"I don't want to say they're not good hitters, but I kinda made them look good," Romero said. "I've played against these guys since I was 10 years old, and I have never seen them hit the ball like that."

Orlando Griego, the Ravens head coach, said his team prepared specifically for Romero and lined up several left-handers for practice.

"We had a plan of attack and our kids followed that plan," Griego said. "I think we had some success with it, but you've got to give Santa Fe High credit. They had every reason to lay down and die, but they didn't."