ST. GEORGE— The Cedar Redmen rallied from a 2-0 deficit, then capitalized on a key error to come out on top over the Dixie Flyers, 3-2, Friday night at Don Lay Flyer Field.

Cedar’s win helped put the Redmen in prime position to secure a post-season berth heading into the final week of region competition, while the Flyers face desperation going down the home stretch.

“Tonight’s win was big for us,” Cedar coach Eric Fieldsted said. “It puts us with six wins with two games to go and we feel like that six was the magic number for us to get a playoff spot.”

The Flyers jumped out to an early lead in the second inning, but were unable to hold on to their lead amid sloppy play and three defensive errors. In the top of the sixth, the Flyers, facing a log jam of runners on-base with the game tied, nearly escaped unscathed thanks to two strikeouts and effective pitching by Braxton Ipson. Almost avoiding meltdown, the fatal error came when Cedar’s Morgan Garrett hit an infield grounder with two outs in the inning. His grounder, which appeared to be Dixie’s ticket out of the inning, proved too slippery to handle. As the defense struggled to corral it, CHS baserunner Rykker Tom sprinted to home plate and cashed in from third base with the go-ahead run.

“We were fortunate tonight,” Fieldsted said. “We capitalized on a mistake of theirs and we got the bases loaded, then Tom got a hit and we hit him over to third. Braxton (Ipson) did a great job keeping us off balance and then Morgan came up and put it in play. He put it in the hole and made it a tough play on them and it worked out for us.”

Garrett noted that the atmosphere was electric during those clutch moments of the game when Cedar took the lead.

“It is exciting,” Garrett said. “It is really exciting when it is tied and it is on the wire and can go either way. You can feel the tension in the air in these region match-ups. We just put the ball in play and hustled.”

The Flyers tried to rally the bats in the bottom of the sixth and seventh innings, but were hitless in the final two stanzas. Dixie head coach Danny Ipson also commented on the missed opportunities.

“We had our moments tonight,” Ipson said. “We made some great plays and we had some opportunities to shut them down, but we didn’t make those plays. We had opportunities to take the lead and win it with that bat, but we didn’t do it.”

In the second inning, DHS’s Brayden Oaks and Chris Petrosie each collected RBI singles to help the Flyers strike first. Dixie held a 2-0 lead until Cedar’s Garrett and Josh Boyer evened the count with their own RBI singles in the top of the fifth, setting up the decisive sixth inning.

The final line showed that the difference between the two teams was ultimately the defensive miscues. Cedar scored three runs on seven hits and left seven on base while Dixie scored two runs on seven hits and left four on base, but committed three costly errors that ended up costing them the game.

“It’s a really good win,” Garrett said. “I was really happy for our guys and there is something about this Cedar team that doesn’t really phase me. We are a very confident team and I know we are good enough to be there (in the state playoffs) and that every team in this region is good enough to be there. We just played our game and had fun tonight and that is what baseball is all about.”

The Redmen improved to 16-5 overall and 6-4 in region while the Flyers dropped to 11-10 and 4-6. The Redmen will face Hurricane twice next week while the Flyers await a two game series with Pine View.

Region 9	W	L	RS	RA	pct.	W	L	RS	RA	pct.
Desert Hills	8	2	62	26	.800	16	4	141	39	.800
Canyon View	7	5	67	52	.583	13	8	126	97	.619
Cedar	6	4	47	29	.600	16	5	145	52	.762
Snow Canyon	5	5	69	73	.500	11	10	153	151	.524
Pine View	5	5	57	60	.500	10	9	119	104	.526
Dixie	4	6	59	46	.400	11	10	127	97	.524
Hurricane	1	9	28	103	.100	7	12	106	181	.368

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