5A Baseball Recap 2026
5A was very top heavy in 2026, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t talent on every other team. A few loaded teams battled it out all year long, but there are still can’t miss prospects found on other teams!
Regular Season
5A was always a 3 headed monster from the very beginning. (Until it wasn’t?) Gameday Picks had Spanish Fork at 1, Pleasant Grove at 2, Maple Mountain at 3 to kick off our preseason rankings, but one thing was consistent with anyones rankings… those were the 3.
The Spanish Fork Dons came into the 2026 year hot off one of the greatest cinderella runs in UHSAA history. The Dons were the 20 SEED!?!? and won 9 games in the 2025 state tournament to become state champions. If that team were playing in the years prior to the RPI format change they wouldn’t have even sniffed the tournament…. Insane! With a lot of young talent from that team returning, the Dons were marked as the favorites to repeat. There are a few teams in the entire state that are loaded at every position, but this is one of them and they have a case that they’re the best. This team led the entire state in wins as the only team to hit the 30 win mark. And they put together no cupcake of a schedule. The Dons went perfect in the month of March to start out the year with marquee wins over Lehi, Snow Canyon (4A State champs) Corner Canyon and Jordan. Spanish Fork had 3 boys reach over .400 BA on the year with Nixon Warren, Sammy Dart and Trigg Cloward. On the other side the Dons had a very well put together 4 man pitching rotation with some other guys stepping up when needed. Kayden Lambson led the way with 48 innings pitched and canned a big time 75 batters. Meanwhile southpaw Sammy Dart tallied up 8 wins on the year while also adding 57 strikeouts. Pratt Morley was spectacular on the bump posting a ridiculous 0.97 ERA. Last but not least senior Matai Johnson finished with a perfect 6-0 record to close out his high school career while also dropping 6 bombs at the plate!
Crazy enough it was not the Spanish Fork Dons who took home the region 7 title, it was the Pleasant Grove Vikings who completed a 2-0 regular season sweep against SF. The Vikings didn’t start off the season terribly, but did drop the majority of their losses at the beginning. It was that Spanish Fork series that really boosted PG. That series propelled them to an 11 game win streak and only dropping 1 more game before the state tournament. Nash Clement led the way for the Vikings slashing at .443! The Vikings added 6 others that eclipsed the .300 mark in the rest of their lineup with Tavake Wolfgramm, Ryder Huntsman, Keaton Nordick, Tobin Degelbeck, Cole Ybarra and Davey Staffieri. PG’s strength however was there pitching. Arizona State commit Mason Henry was throwing gas all year long and had the off speed touch dialed in. 90 K’s in the 221 batters he faced. Henry was a strikeout machine. BYU commits Keaton Nordick and Ryder Huntsman both eclipsed 70 strikeouts themselves while combining for 12 wins! Crew Anderson stepped in when needed both on the bump with a 1.66 ERA and at the plate hitting .478 and 2 dingers on limited at bats.
The 3rd team that makes up that 3 headed monster is Maple Mountain. The blue chip prospect and D-News 5A player of the year Jeremiah Hall was GOLDEN for the Eagles. Despite only being a sophomore Hall is disgusting on the mound. However it was his hitting campaign that really took the state by storm. .462 Average at the plate while nuking 8 baseballs over the fence, and stealing 23 bags. Fellow sophomore teammate Mitch Walker was also spectacular! Walker dropped 7 bombs himself while keeping up at a .389 BA. A scary duo that is just scratching the surface for Maple Mountain. What’s even scarier is that they’ll have Kye Ward with those 2 as well for the next 2 years plus one as he was only a Freshman this year! Ward was very productive in his high school debut already hitting .366 from the plate! The Eagles will be missing 2 big time players next year in Cayden Giles and Lincoln Beenfield who went out with a bang. Giles hit .447 with 12 doubles and Beenfield hit .374 with 4 triples! One of the most under appreciated pitchers we have in the state is Maple Mountains own Kavyn Carter. Carter was phenomenal in his Junior season! An 11-2 record with a 2.10 ERA on very high volume tossing 76 innings! Carter faced top end talent all year long and showed out!
The 3 headed monster slowly but surely turned in to 4. The West Field Longhorns flew under the radar for quite some time. Playing in a lesser region it was difficult to see if this team was for real or if they were just beating up on subpar teams. Spoiler alert… they proved themselves to be legit! Wyatt Penrod went NUCLEAR for West Field! A stat line of .535 BA, 50 RBI, 11 2B, 8 HR is asinine. It’s true though. He did that. One of the best stat lines in the entire state. West Field was not a 1 man show though. The longhorns didn’t have 1, not 2, not 3, not 4, not 5, but 6 other players hit over .400 on the year on top of Penrod’s season. Kason Taylor, Sam Smith, Grady Garrett, Brady Penland, Marshall Moon and Tyke Johnson were those guys! Garrett and Moon combined for 13 triples, meanwhile Garrett and Smith combined for 9 dingers. Kason Taylor is just a sophomore and led 5A with 26 stolen bags with some stellar play at short for West Field on top of his .487 BA. West Field had multiple different guys throwing for them but it’s Bryce Bagby who gets the headline here going a perfect 9-0 throwing 52 innings for the Longhorns.
State Tournament
The 5A state tournament got underway and we immediately saw the 22 seed Roy Royals send home 11 seed Kearns early in 2 games. Meanwhile the 21 seed Skyline Eagles did the same to 12 seed Taylorsville. Roy’s season would end at the hands of West Jordan in the next round, but the Eagles weren’t done. Skyline took care of 5 seed Cyprus in 2 games as well and eventually ended in the top 6! A great run! Other than that we were left with the 4 headed monster in the final 4! What more could you ask for? It did not disappoint!
State Semifinals
Maple Mountain and Pleasant Grove faced off 3 different times in this tournament with PG getting the first one earlier, but Maple Mountain got the next 2 in the semifinals thanks to a complete game by Kavyn Carter in a win or go home game!
The other side of the semis was ABSOLUTE CINEMA! West Field proved they were legit when they took down the Dons 11-10 in their first meeting earlier giving them the upper hand heading into the semis. The Dons would have to beat West Field twice if they wanted to go back to the state championship game. Game 1 of the semis was an intense 2-2 ball game that had to be settled in extras. Sammy Dart and Pratt Morley delivered big time on the bump to help the Dons fight to see another day. Game 3 between the 2 of them win or go home saw Spanish up 9-1, but the Longhorns rallied back with a 7 run 5th inning and getting another one in the 6th to tie this ball game up. Well… bottom of the 7th tied ball game and Pratt Morley goes KABOOOOOM!!!!! WALK OFF BOMB!!!! Morley would send the Dons to the title game once again! An all time instant classic… and a major shoutout to the West Field Longhorns on a terrific season from a great ball club!
State Championship
The state championship has loaded in. Cross town rivals, Maple Mountain and Spanish Fork. Competing for it all!
Game 1 went to the dons in a tight one 5-4! Matai Johnson was big for the Dons on the bump going 5 innings and Spanish Fork takes game 1 despite Jeremiah Hall’s 3 for 3 day with a deep shot.
Game 2 Hall made sure the Eagles were victorious as he was near perfect on the bump going 6 and two thirds giving up only 1 hit and walking 2 batters tossing 8 K’s. The Dons never stood a chance.
Game 3 was Trigg Cloward willing the Dons to secure the state championship! Cloward smacked a home run, 2 doubles and drove in 4 runs in a game that saw the Dons winning 8-4! Sammy Dart was clutch on the bump yet again for Spanish Fork as they go BACK TO BACK!
Spanish Fork had so many different heroes throughout the year which is what made this team special. So many studs on this team including those not mentioned yet with guys like Jason Pintar, Cody McLean, Cohen Nelson and Boston Duvall all being vital to this squad!
Season Standouts
Noyker Velasquez, Reiner Hidalgo and Brody Densley hit 2nd, 3rd and 4th in batting average in 5A for the Cyprus Pirates as they led the way to a 20 win season.
Big time sophomore prospect Austin Brown showed out for the Wasps dropping 10 bombs and 11 doubles while keeping his BA up to .417 in the best region in 5A.
McCoy Johnson had himself a monster year posting a stat line of .405 BA, 10 HR, 10 2B and a first team all state mention to close his high school career for Alta.
Soren Swing led 5A with an OBP of .640 and had a great batting average .467 for Olympus tacking on 30 RBI’s as well!
Kasen Pearson, Adam Mikesell, Ashur Clark and Bodee Hawkins led Fremont to a great season with 40+ hits each, while Tad Grange added 37 of his own and led the way pitching with an 8-2 record and 2.76 ERA.
Final Thoughts
5A was top heavy… there’s’ no doubt about it. But those teams were the best of the best. Spanish Fork goes back to back, but it wasn’t a cakewalk by any measure. We saw true title contenders battle it out multiple different times that could’ve gone either way. But the Dons somehow found a way just like last year. They have no quit in them! They are re loading with a big chunk of their roster returning… but so are some of the other top dawgs! 2027 will be a fun one!