The Guthrie baseball program is making back-to-back state tournament appearances after missing out in the five previous seasons.
The third ranked BlueJays will enter the state tournament with a 28-6 record and will play the Durant Lions.
Durant punched their ticket with a 5-0 win over Coweta. The fifth ranked Lions are making their first state tournament appearance since 1994.
The Guthrie/Durant winner will play the winner between Shawnee and Claremore. Claremore has spent a majority of the season on top of the 5A rankings despite being currently ranked No. 2. The Zebra’s are 30-4. Meanwhile, Shawnee enters with a 25-11 record and ranked seventh.
Last year, the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association agreed to make the 5A and 6A state tournaments a single-elimination format after several years of playing the double-elimination format.
The bottom half of the state bracket features Deer Creek versus McAlester and top ranked Carl Albert taking on Skiatook.
The Suburban Conference is represented very well with four teams: Guthrie, Carl Albert, Deer Creek and Shawnee.
The BlueJays are 5-2 against teams in the field, including a win over Skiatook and two wins over both Deer Creek and Shawnee. The Jays dropped both their games with Carl Albert.
Guthrie last went to back-to-back state tournaments in 2004 and 2005. In the ’04 campaign the Jays dropped their first two games to McAlester (23-8) and Duncan (6-4).
The Jays made a deeper run in the 2004 season after losing in the first game to Bishop Kelley 3-2. Guthrie responded with two wins (Pryor 17-16, McGuinness 13-10) to reach the state semi-finals before losing to the eventual state champ Bishop Kelley (8-4) for the second time in three days.
In last year’s tournament, the Jays lost to Bishop Kelley (18-14) and Carl Albert (6-3).
The BlueJays have one state title in 1989.
5A State Tournament Bracket
Thursday – At Tulsa Union
Game 1: Durant 8, Guthrie 2
Game 2: Claremore 8, Shawnee 4
Game 3: McAlester 12, Deer Creek 5
Game 4: Carl Albert 4, Skiatook 0
Friday – At Tulsa Union
Game 5: Claremore 15, Durant 6
Game 6: Carl Albert 10, McAlester 2
Saturday – At Oral Roberts University
Game 7: Carl Albert 6, Claremore 2
Three Freshman? Really? Impressive, I didn’t know there were any starting.