EVERETT — It was a day Michael Alcayaga would have loved — bright sunshine and a Cascade High School baseball game.
On Monday afternoon, nearly 11 months after Alcayaga died of leukemia, the Bruins honored their former teammate during a game against Jackson. The Cascade players and coaches wore orange “Leukemia Awareness” socks, there was an orange “Play 4 Michael” message painted on the grass behind home plate, and Alcayaga’s father, Bill, threw out the ceremonial first pitch.
“Michael loved baseball,” Bill Alcayaga said. “Baseball and basketball, those were the two sports he loved to play.”
Michael Alcayaga was diagnosed with leukemia in August of 2013 and died on May 20 of last year. A 16-year-old Cascade sophomore at the time of his death, he had been an outfielder on the junior-varsity baseball team the year before.
Monday’s game was played in Alcayaga’s memory, and a similar game will be played every year “for as long as I’m here,” Bruins coach Scott Stencil said. “We want to remember what Michael was all about and what he did for bringing our Cascade community together, and we want to make sure we do everything we can to cherish his memory.”
The game is “a chance to celebrate his life, a chance to remember, and a chance to thank his family for everything he did for Cascade,” Stencil said.
Unfortunately for the Bruins, the game’s outcome was a disappointment. Jackson batted around in the first inning for three runs, tacked on two more runs in the second, and that turned out to be plenty of offense for Timberwolves senior starting pitcher Tyler Wingert, who checked Cascade on four hits in a 5-1 victory.
Wingert, a right-hander in his fourth varsity season, was never in serious trouble. The Bruins got their only run in the third inning with a leadoff single, a passed ball, an infield out and an infield single.
When Cascade got the first two hitters aboard in the sixth, Wingert snuffed the potential rally with back-to-back infield grounders, the second an inning-ending double play.
“I had a senior pitcher act like a senior pitcher today,” Jackson coach Kirk Nicholson said. “He came ready to throw.”
Moreover, Nicholson pointed out, Wingert walked just three and the T-wolves played error-free defense, “so we didn’t give a lot of free bases up today. And if you can do that, you’re not a bad high school team.”
Alec Anderson, Anton Soderqvist and Alex Cheesman — the Nos. 3, 4 and 5 hitters in Jackson’s lineup — each went 2-for-4. Anderson scored twice, Soderqvist drove in two runs, including one with a long triple to left-center field in the second inning, and Cheesman had three RBI, with two coming on a double to left in the first.
After facing 15 hitters through the first two innings, Cascade starter Matthew Butler settled into a nice rhythm. He allowed just two base runners over the final five innings, and at one point struck out five straight batters. Butler, a senior southpaw, finished with nine strikeouts and three walks, the latter all in the first inning.
After the game, both teams stuck around for a barbecue dinner that was part of the event honoring the memory of Michael Alcayaga.
“As I told the guys, 10 years from now they’re not going to remember whether they won or lost, but they’re going to remember this,” Stencil said. “And that’s what it’s really about.
“We would’ve loved to have won the game,” he said, “but I think the emotions got the better of us a little bit in the beginning. But that’s OK. Because that’s not the most important thing about today.”
At Cascade H.S.
Jackson 320 000 0 — 5 8 0
Cascade 000 000 0 — 1 4 1
Tyler Wingert and Jeremy Martin; Matthew Butler, Kelly King (7) and Austin Pinorini. WP—Wingert. LP—Butler. 2B—Alex Cheesman (J). 3B—Anton Soderqvist (J). Records—Jackson 1-1 league, 3-5 overall. Cascade 1-1, 2-5
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