<
>

Knights Edge HarbourCats 4-2

The Corvallis Knights repeated as West Coast League champions Tuesday night by beating Victoria 4-2 at Goss Stadium before a crowd of 1,430.

Corvallis captured its fifth WCL title by taking the decisive third game of the 2017 WCLCS.

Victoria opened the series Saturday night with a 5-4 walk-off win at Royal Athletic Park before a WCL single-game playoff record crowd of 2,789. The Knights evened the series on Monday night with a 6-0 blanking of the HarbourCats at Goss Stadium.

UC Riverside junior-to-be pitchers Trenton Toplikar and Hazahel Quijada starred for Corvallis as Toplikar earned the win tossing 7 solid innings allowing only an unearned run. Quijada slammed the door in the ninth, as the southpaw entered with runners on first and second with no out and proceeded to retire the next three batters on a force out and two strikeouts to earn the save.

The Knights were led offensively by Zak Taylor of Oregon State, who homered, and Matt Kelly of Portland and Elliot Willy of Oregon State, who both collected two hits and doubled.

Nevada-Reno first baseman Dillan Shrum plated the Knights final run with a RBI single in the fifth-inning.

Saturday’s hero, Po-Hao Huang, collected two hits for the HarbourCats. Victoria swept Kelowna in the WCL North Divisional Series to advance to the WCLCS, the ‘Cats first finals appearance.

ABOUT THE WEST COAST LEAGUE

The West Coast League is the premier summer collegiate baseball league west of the Mississippi. The 13-year-old, 11-team, professionally operated wood-bat league located in the beautiful Pacific Northwest features pro prospects from major conferences across the nation and an unparalleled history out west of great fan and player experiences in addition to the best summer weather in North America. 82 players with WCL experience were selected in the MLB 2017 June draft. In 2016, more than 230 WCL alums appeared in affiliated professional baseball including 28 in the major leagues, such as 2015 home-run leader Chris Davis (Baltimore), 2015 NL Rookie of the Year runner-up Matt Duffy (Tampa Bay) and rising star pitchers Matt Andriese (Tampa Bay), Matt Boyd (Detroit) and James Paxton (Seattle); and outfielder Mitch Haniger (Arizona, now Seattle). Overall member attendance was 379,611 in 2016.