June 23, 2025
By Adam Burns
COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa — Still in his catcher’s gear and covered in dirt, Mitch Earnest was grinning from ear to ear near where he spent many innings and hours over the last five days in the grueling heat and gusty wind conditions — home plate.
Earnest, along with his fellow teammate Hudson Gardner, led the Utah Select to a 10-7 victory in eight innings over the Sixers (Cifuentes) on Sunday afternoon to capture the Omaha Slumpbuster 13u D1 Gold Championship at the Council Bluffs Recreation Complex.
“It’s an amazing feeling because we struggled a bit to start the tournament,” Earnest said. “It was great to win our last six games after a couple of losses; we started hitting the ball well the last few games, and it just felt amazing to take care of business today.”
His coach agreed.
“Our kids earned this win,” said Travis Gillespie, head coach of Utah Select. “It feels great. We didn’t hit great the last three weeks but after our 3-2 loss to BPA Black, we started playing much better.”
The hardware — and the rings — were well-earned, too. The Sixers battled back from a 7-2 deficit with two runs in the fifth inning and three in the sixth to knot the score at 7-all in the bottom of the sixth.
Thanks to a big three-run eighth inning and the bat of Gardner, the Vineyard, Utah-based team overcame that furious comeback attempt. How? Of course, Gardner was on the case as he doubled down the left-field line to score the first run, and Madden Daley drove in a pair with a double to right field.
To increase his candidacy for MVP of the championship contest, Gardner notched the win on the mound with three innings of one-hit ball. Simply put, Gardner had himself a game, also going 3-for-4 with four total RBI at the plate. It was a coming-out party of sorts for Gardner, who has spent some time rehabbing a recent injury.
“He hurt his elbow in the Spring Training tournament in Arizona, in the very first inning of the season, so he hasn’t pitched or played much the whole season,” Gillespie said. “To have him come in and throw some valuable innings for us today and get some key hits, it was phenomenal. He’s been a clutch player for us since he was seven, so it was fun to see him succeed today.”
Several other Utah Select players contributed two-hit games including Deacon Telford, Damon Bateman and Jude Rammell.
But back to Earnest. He was certainly smiling because of the title game victory, but he was also thankful for a couple of other reasons.
For starters, the cleanup hitter was 4-for-4 with three RBI. Secondly, after the game, one of the umpires pulled him aside and praised him on his game and his presence behind the plate — the ultimate compliment a 13-year-old can receive, especially after catching seven games in the last five days.
“It was amazing because I know how hard I work. I do drills a couple of hours per day and it’s cool that it’s showing up in the games. It motivates me to keep it up and see where it takes me moving forward.
“It was so much fun to be here in Omaha and enjoy the College World Series, dreaming of playing there one day,” he added. “It was so much fun being around baseball 24/7. It was just the best.”
Coach Gillespie was also all-in on the baseball fun this week in Omaha.
“This was our ninth game in four days, and we’ve watched three or four College World Series games and some AAA baseball games,” Gillespie said. “So we’ve seen and played in a lot of baseball games the last week, but this group lives and breathes baseball — and it’s why we come here. This is like a human version of Field of Dreams. We are just living the best baseball life we can here.”
And that’s what the Omaha Slumpbuster is all about.
Utah Select finished the tournament with a 6-1 record — not including warmup action. Gillespie called out that one of their warmup games included a loss to the Sixers, a 20-5 result.
“Give it to our opponent,” he said. “They beat us 20-5 in our second warmup game. They killed us because they’re a great team. But we battled today. We’re a comeback team.”
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