Auburn Riverside and Auburn Mountainview stumbled in district seeding games last weekend, but both baseball programs are poised to make some noise in Saturday’s state playoff openers.

Each program is making its second trip to state.

The Ravens (14-10) earned a ticket to the 4A state tournament with a dramatic 14-12 comeback victory over Union last Thursday at Kent. Two days later at Heritage Park in Puyallup, Auburn Riverside blew a five-run lead in the sixth inning and dropped a wild 11-10 decision to Federal Way for the No. 5 seed to state from West Central/Southwest District III.

As the district’s No. 8 seed, Auburn Riverside must go on the road to Yakima County Stadium to face Walla Walla (20-6) in a state opener at 1 p.m. Saturday. Walla Walla beat Richland, 6-5, to claim its regional title Saturday.

The Ravens’ ace, junior Mike Rucker, will get the start against Walla Walla.

Kell Garrison and Cam Grad each went 4-for-4 and drove in two runs for the Ravens against Federal Way. Grad tripled. Garrison scored twice. John Hakala went 3-for-4 and scored twice.

“Our crazy games have made us a little tougher … I hope,” said Ravens coach Chris Garrison. “It’s made for some great memories and stories to remember.

“We are getting enough hits and runs. We just need to hang on when Rucker does not pitch.”

Austin Marty, a sophomore shortstop, keys the Ravens’ attack, getting on base about 50 percent of the time.

Federal Way, meanwhile, will face Bothell in the state opener at Kent as the No. 5 seed. Washington State-bound Nick Tanielu led the Eagles, going 4-for-4 with three runs and three RBI.

Auburn Mountainview heads to 3A state as the No. 4 seed from district.

The Lions dropped a pair of seeding games Saturday – 12-0 to heralded Camas and 11-5 to Timberline. But the Lions earlier secured a state placement by blasting Wilson last Thursday, 9-0, in WC/Southwest bi-district play in Tacoma. Brice McCulloch went 3-for-3 and drove in two runs for the Lions. He also scored twice. Kekoa Nahaku and Derek Stephen each had two hits to support winning pitcher Steven Johnson.

“We’re fine. We were really down on pitching. We played two very good teams,” said Lions coach Glen Walker. “We did not play up to our potential in either game on Saturday but I felt offensively we did fine. We hit a lot of hard ‘at ’em’ balls that were turned into outs and double plays, while at the same time, our opponents hit a lot of balls that were just out of our reach on defense and weren’t hit extremely well.”

Auburn Mountainview (13-11) will play Seattle Prep at 10 a.m. Saturday at Mount Vernon’s Dream Field.

“Seattle Prep is a very good team from the Metro League,” Walker said. “They come into the tourney as the No. 1 Metro seed and No. 2 seed overall in District 2. They have some good players and have a solid squad.”

Johnson will get the start Saturday. Junior Chris Hunter likely will get the start if the Lions advance to Saturday’s quarterfinals.

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For state brackets, visit www.wiaa.com.