For a season which was supposed to be full of promise, the Sentinel baseball team experienced disappointment.

After finishing 2-18 and defeating only Rogers and Bethel, Coach Bryan Davis and his coaching staff have nowhere to go but up.

“This season was very frustrating because we were more talented than most of the teams,” said Davis. “We are really better than our stats show.”

Statistically speaking, the Sentinels finished toward the bottom in most categories and only two players received all-league honors: outfielder Miles Rodriguez and pitcher Jason Salers.

The Sentinels first win came almost a month into the season when they defeated Rogers 6-5 behind the hitting of Chase Dutcher, Andrew Oney, and Justin Clousser. The trio combined for eight of the team’s fifteen hits and Oney drove in the game winning run in the seventh inning.

Once the Sentinels knocked off Rogers, the team’s confidence level began to grow. However, three nights later they received a devastating blow when brand-new Graham-Kapowsin high school provided a 10-0 rout.

“I was surprised,” said Todd Keister, assistant coach at Graham-Kapowsin and a coach at Spanaway Lake last season. “I was expecting the team to look a little sharper. Realistically, they played very well against us; however they made a couple mistakes which lost the game for them.”

The Sentinels did not let the G-K game discourage them as they went out and beat in-district rival Bethel the next night 7-2 as Dutcher and Salers combined to allow four hits.

In a season that was full of disappointments, Davis and his staff realize that this was a stepping stone in the process of rebuilding the program into a winner.