Sometimes the scoreboard doesn’t tell the whole story.

The Newport Knights may have defeated the Skyline Spartans 6-2 in a battle between Class 4A KingCo juggernauts on April 24 in Sammamish, but the Spartans left their home-field knowing they proved themselves against one of Washington’s top baseball programs.

Skyline (9-7 overall) took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning when Jonathan Criest blasted a double to left field, scoring a hustling David Kringle from first base. The Spartans maintained a 1-0 advantage until the top of the sixth. Newport (14-2 overall) put up three runs and sent seven batters to the plate in the top of the sixth, taking a 3-1 lead. Skyline added a run in the bottom of the sixth cutting Newport’s lead to 3-2. Newport added three more runs in the top of the seventh to put the game away. Skyline coach Steve Darnell was proud of his squad’s performance against the Knights, despite the loss.

“We competed. We had quality pitching and played good defense. Newport is a very good team and are very experienced. We are a very young team,” Darnell said. “We played some very good baseball today outside of two innings (sixth and seventh).”

Skyline starting pitcher Sam Lawrence had a proficient game on the bump, allowing just four hits and three earned runs in six innings of work. Newport ace Todd Reese was impressive as well surrendering just five hits and two earned runs in seven innings on the hill. Reese allowed three hits in the first two innings before finding his groove in the final five innings of play with a wide assortment of change-ups and breaking balls.

“We didn’t make adjustments at the plate. Their pitcher (Reese) made adjustments to our hitters. We started seeing more off-speed stuff and we weren’t able to make the adjustments. That was the difference in the game,” Darnell said.

Newport head coach Brad Files said both teams arrived at the showdown playing their best baseball of the season. Newport came into the contest on a six-game winning streak while Skyline had won four straight contests.

“Something had to give,” Files said of both team’s winning streaks. “We got a veteran club. We didn’t panic, we stuck together and pulled it out in the end. Nothing is going to be easy. We needed a game like that today to show some grit.”

Shaun Scott: 425-453-5045; sscott@bellevuereporter.com