Baker blasts La Grande 16-6 in league softball opener

Baker/Powder Valley/Pine Eagle sent a message across the Greater Oregon League by overpowering rival La Grande 16-6 in five innings Thursday at the Baker Sports Complex.

The Bulldogs turned the league opener into a run-rule win behind Colbi Bachman’s biggest night of the season. Bachman went 3 for 4 and drove in eight runs, powering the offense with a grand slam and a three-run double as Baker/Powder Valley/Pine Eagle piled up 16 runs against a conference opponent that had beaten them twice in La Grande a year earlier.

Reagan Ritter backed the offense with a steady five innings in the circle, allowing six hits and striking out three. With Ritter limiting damage and the Bulldogs scoring in bunches, the game never settled into a back-and-forth rivalry fight. Baker forced the early finish and showed the kind of depth and pressure that can matter when league standings start to tighten.

The result carried added weight because it came against La Grande/Imbler/Elgin, another 4A-6 Greater Oregon League team, in the first game of a doubleheader at 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. at the Baker Sports Complex. For Baker, the win was more than a hot start at home. It was a sharp reversal after a volatile stretch that had included a 9-8 loss at Molalla on April 10, a 6-1 loss at Gladstone on April 11, and a much-needed 16-0 win over Umatilla on April 14 to snap a four-game losing streak.

That rebound mattered because the Umatilla game had been moved out of Baker after the field was left unplayable by Sunday’s record-setting rainstorm. Getting back home for league play, then putting up 16 runs against La Grande, gave Baker/Powder Valley/Pine Eagle a clean look at what its ceiling might be if the bats keep producing like this.

The Bulldogs have already shown they can win in different ways. On March 26, Bachman hit a walkoff solo home run in a 3-2 win over Warrenton, and Baker also beat Burns in another three-inning game that day. After an April 4 win over Crook County, the Baker City Herald had the Bulldogs ranked seventh in Class 4A, and Thursday’s rout offered another reason to take that standing seriously.

It also brought a clear measure of revenge. Baker/Powder Valley/Pine Eagle had lost both ends of its 2025 league opener at La Grande, falling 11-3 and 12-2 while La Grande surged to 13-0 and 2-0 in league. One year later, the Bulldogs answered at home with power, pitching and a run-rule rout that suggested they may be ready to control the Greater Oregon League instead of chasing it.