East Ridge H.S. baseball team fights through top-tier competition to earn spot in state tourney

WOODBURY, Minn. -- The baseball state tournament starts on Tuesday morning. East Ridge, the No. 2 seed, fought through some of best competition in the state to earn a tournament berth.

East Ridge High School opened in Woodbury in 2009. In 2019, the baseball team made its first state tournament and won the whole thing. Back then, this year's graduating class was in eighth grade.

"I was actually sitting right to the side of the dugout, the East Ridge dugout, sitting in that front row when they won it. And I just thought that was amazing," said senior pitcher Trevor Lee. "I was like, 'that's something that I wanna be a part of.' And now here's this opportunity."

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Section 4 is as tough as it comes in Minnesota high school baseball. East Ridge needed two championship games to knock off powerhouse Cretin-Derham Hall in the section final.

"Very entertaining, even to be a part of. It's something that you live for, really," said sophomore standup pitcher and utility player Luke Ryerse. "It's those moments that you really work for the entire year."  

"It gives us a ton of confidence," said Lee, a Wichita State commit. "Cretin was labeled as the number one team in the state for most of the year. So to go in there and beat them twice and take care of business in our section gives us a ton of confidence. We feel like we can beat anyone we play."

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"Having a huge win against Cretin, especially after losing to them earlier in the year, I think we're probably at our most confident for sure right now when we need it the most," said senior outfielder Aidan Makovicka.

"It's another ball game you gotta play. So we take whatever we can from that, the energy we got from that and see where it takes us," said Brian Sprout, the Raptors head coach, who's been leading the program since the school opened its doors.

East Ridge kicks off the AAAA state tournament on Tuesday morning at 10 a.m., facing Lakeville South in the quarterfinal at CHS Field in St. Paul.

"All those morning practices at six in the morning in the gym that we ran, captains practices since January, all kind of built up to this moment," said Ryerse. "We've worked to get to this spot, and now it's so close we're just excited to take it."