RIO RANCHO — The quality of the field at this year’s Sal Puentes Invitational had the Carlsbad Cavemen deep in thought this week.
“That’s the reason we come up here every year, is for good competition,” Carlsbad baseball coach Cody May said. “Starting Monday, we talked about treating this like a mini state tournament.”
Four of the top eight ranked teams in Class 5A — No. 2 Cleveland, No. 3 Rio Rancho, No. 4 Carlsbad and No. 8 Sandia — are crammed into the eight-team Puentes bracket.
So as Carlsbad polished off Cleveland 12-3 on Thursday in the first round of the 2023 event at Rio Rancho High, the defending state champion Cavemen had some extra spring in their postgame chatter.
“Today,” senior center fielder Tristin Thomas said, “you see what we’re capable of, and we haven’t shown that at all through the beginning of the year.”
Senior Mack Mabrey retired the first 11 Storm batters on a cold day — the game was even briefly interrupted by rain — and surrendered just two hits over 5 ⅔ innings. He struck out eight in his best performance of the season.
Mabrey also hit a solo home run for Carlsbad (12-2), which will face Sandia at 4 p.m. Friday in the semifinals.
Mabrey, a hard-throwing southpaw, was the No. 2 starter for Carlsbad in its 2022 championship season behind Nolan Perry — who was drafted in the 12th round last summer by the Toronto Blue Jays — but almost certainly would have been the ace most anywhere else.
“I just need to approach it like, don’t let the moment get too big and do what I know how to do,” said the 6-foot-2 Mabrey (2-1). “And stick with the basics of what I’ve always done. So if I can just do that all year long, I think I’ll be just fine.”
May said he chatted with Mabrey on Wednesday.
“He knows he’s our dude,” May said. “We challenged him last night at the hotel. It’s like, ‘Mack, you’re our man, and you haven’t proved it yet. And tomorrow you have a good test ahead of you to see what you’re made of.’ ”
Cleveland (10-3) gifted Carlsbad a handful of runs in the early going — four of the Cavemen’s first seven runs over the first four inning were the result of Storm errors or wild pitches.
Sprinkled in was also an RBI double by Thomas (who later in the game added an RBI single), and a solo shot to left center by Mabrey that made it 7-0. The game was 9-0 before Cleveland scored in the bottom of the sixth.
“We’re a good baseball team, but we haven’t played what we’re capable of,” May said. “Today, we showed what we’re capable of when we play well.”
This is Carlsbad’s only trip to the metro area in the regular season.
“All these teams, they’re the top of the state, so we need to put on our best performance,” Mabrey said.
Thomas said the Cavemen — whose two losses are to Centennial and El Paso Americas — struggled to find their chemistry early in the season.
“This is a big tournament for us,” Thomas said. “This is a tournament to prove ourselves and where we actually stand in the state.”
Sandia (8-4) beat Artesia 13-1 in six innings, scoring six runs in the second inning. Zach Kmatz surrendered just one infield single in five innings of work for the Matadors. In Thursday’s first game, Valley (8-6) downed Albuquerque Academy 3-1 behind a complete game, three-hit, 10-strikeout effort from senior lefty Alex Gilliam.
At 6:30 p.m. Friday, Valley plays the host Rams who beat Goddard 12-4 on Thursday night. Vascon Smith hit a three-run home run and Josh Boyer a two-run shot, both in the first inning for Rio Rancho (11-1-2).
