Forever Red: Baseball and softball

This week baseball and softball take the forefront.

Much of Colusa's success on the diamonds has been recent. Only one team from either sport has captured a section championship.

BASEBALL

The 1997 Redskins baseball team holds the only Northern Section baseball championship in school history. Led by Luke Steidlmayer, Colusa pulled off a storybook victory on the road against Lassen High in Susanville.

Though known for his pitching, Steidlmayer made his mark on the championship game with his bat, crushing the only home run of his high school career. The three-run shot gave Colusa the lead when it sailed over the left-center field wall in the fourth inning on May 17.

Starting pitcher Brad Alvarez gave up five runs in the first inning before the game's other hero, Arturo Lucero, got the final two outs of the inning and kept the Grizzlies off the board the rest of the game for a 9-5 victory.

The Redskins finished the game with eight extra base hits, while scoring three runs in the third and four in the fourth.

"It was typical Colusa," co-coach Dave Driffill said. "We had about 12 kids total, but that group of kids just had a number of real good athletes. We won the league in football and basketball."

Current coach Mike West and Driffill coached the team together and it helped the team reach its potential, Driffill said.

"With two good coaches we were able to break down and work with three or four kids at a time," he said.

At the time the section championship was decided by the top two teams from the Westside League and the Butte View League playing in a single elimination tournament for the AAA title.

Steidlemayer would be drafted by the San Diego Padres in the eighth round in 2002. He played four successful years of minor league baseball before an injury derailed his career.

"We had pretty good kids all the way around. They were all three sport athletes," West said. "(Steidlmayer) was absolutely the best and he was by no means as good as he got."

There have been several stretches where Colusa contended for league titles and section championships, but few matched the 1997 season.

A team with a 10-15 record made it to the section championship game in 2007, but lost 8-4 to Modoc. That season foreshadowed the next two seasons when the team went 20-7 and 16-7. Both the 2008 and 2009 teams lost to eventual champion Durham High in the playoffs.

In 1985 and '86, the baseball team reached the section championship game twice, losing to Corning High both years. One of those losses came at the hands of future Oakland Athletics pitcher Mark Acre.

The 1969-71 teams did well thanks to one of the best all-around classes for athletics in Redskins history.

From 1950-56 the Colusa baseball team was a dominant force in the Westside League, winning the league title five years in a row.

In 1955 the Redskins went 16-3 under the leadership of future Oakland Raider Doug Mayberry. Mayberry played pitcher and shortstop on that team along with pitcher Jim Rhoades.

SOFTBALL

The best Redskins softball team was perhaps the last to use the name.

With no section championship to use as a measuring stick, the 33-3-1 record of the 2011 team makes a strong case for being the best softball team at Colusa.

"Since we got the Little League program going the quality of kids we get as freshmen is a lot of times much higher than it used to be," current Colusa coach Randy Watt said.

One of the people to benefit from the Little League experience is second-team small schools All-American pitcher, Tiffany Friel, who led a bevy of solid players to the record-setting season. The Redskins were the favorites to win the Division V title before being upset by Modoc in the playoffs.

"(Friel) was in the second group that started in the minors, so I think she started when she was 8, so maybe 10 years ago," Watt said. "It took maybe six or seven years to get those little kids that started in minors to high school."

Watt points to the teams win-loss record, which was best in school history, as evidence to just how good the team was. The 2011 softball team played a tough schedule against many of the top teams in the Northern Section and beyond.

"This last season we established all the win records and probably most of the team stat records," Watt said.

One of its opponents was Elliot Christian, winner of seven of the last eight Sac-Joaquin Section Division VII championships. Friel engaged in a marathon game that remained scoreless until the perennial power from Lodi scored an unearned run in the eighth inning and won 2-0.

Though 2011 was the team's best year, the senior class was a part of a four-year stretch from 2008-11 that saw Watt's teams go 104-23-5.

Looking farther back in history, Watt points to the 1991 and 1992 seasons when the team made the playoffs as the next best teams he coached.

The Redskins made the playoffs twice under the team's founding coach Pat Tucker during the 1980s, he said.

Editor's note: The student-athletes at Colusa High School during the 2011-12 school year will be the first to compete as the RedHawks after the school board voted to move away from the long-time, yet controversial Redskins mascot.

Every Saturday for the rest of the summer, the Colusa County Sun-Herald takes a look back at some of the greatest teams and players to suit up as Colusa High Redskins.

Did we overlook any great teams? Know of a little-known player or team which achieved greatness? Let us know. E-mail Kirk Barron at kbarron@tcnpress.com or call at 458-2121.