Jordan Rogers is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Washington High School for AZPreps365.com

Wednesday marked opening day for Washington High in a match with the Payson Longhorns.

There was an eagerness on the field from the players in pregame, and that directly translated to how the game began.

Tallying three runs and three hits in the first inning, the Rams got off to a fast start.

“I think it was huge for us to come out of the gates and get three early runs,” head coach Beau Polvorosa said. “With a young team and being nervous and this being opening day, it was good to get those runs early.”

Washington did not have similar luck from innings two through five, as the game ended early due to a time limit put on the games in the Cougar Classic Tournament. The team only scored one run the rest of the game, and Payson came up with four in the final four innings to hand the Rams a 5-4 loss.

The Rams had no shortage of opportunities to score, though, loading the bases in the third and leaving the eventual game-tying run on third base in both the fourth and fifth innings. Polvorosa knows this is something his team can learn from.

“It’s just that pitch-by-pitch mentality,” Polvorosa said. “It’s OK to be nervous, but you have to want to be the guy in those situations.”

Making his high school debut, freshman Pedro Leon got the nod for the Rams on the mound. He threw 76 pitches over four innings while allowing five runs on just four hits. He also issued six walks on the day and struck out just one batter.

“I thought [Leon’s] first start was good,” Polvorosa said. “For a freshman to get his feet wet against a very good team is what you want.”

“He has a very bright future,” Polvorosa added. “There’s just a lot of room for growth.”

Like the Washington offense, Leon had a solid first inning, allowing one run on just 14 pitches.

Things fell off from there as Payson tagged him for three runs in the second.

“I did pretty good, but I fell off a little bit,” Leon said. “I need to work on a lot of things.”

In learning from his start, Leon knows exactly what to do in order to improve moving forward.

“I just need to try not to focus on the last play and I just need to keep moving on,” Leon said.

Polvorosa took notice in his young freshman’s ability to make adjustments and work around some adversity.

“The game sped up on him a bit,” Polvorosa said. “But once he started to settle down and got comfortable, that’s when he got better in his outing.”

Despite the loss, junior catcher Dominic Olivas liked what he saw from the team.

“I feel like they put their heart into this game,” Olivas said. “You could see the love these boys have for the game and it instantly put [Payson] on their heels.”

Polvorosa knows he has a young team, so he likens each and every opportunity on the baseball field to a learning experience. For him, Wednesday’s game was no different.

“We turned the game into a classroom,” Polvorosa said. “We focused on the situations that took place and we created that learning moment with everybody as one.”

It’ll be a quick turnaround for the Rams, as they will play the Odyssey Institute Minotaurs on Thursday at home.