Federal Way's area players lit up the field in the South Puget Sound League North vs. South All-Stars game well - a showcase event that pitted top seniors of the two divisions against each other. The North won both games, 5-2, at the Auburn Mountainview High School field Thursday.

Winning the first game as a pitcher was none of our pitchers, but closing it was. Thomas Jefferson's season ace, Jordan Beers, pitched flawlessly the sixth and seventh innings to pick up the save of the 5-2 first win.

What is the meaning of this game that has all the seniors already committed to various D-1, D-2 schools, and, as the case may be for Beers, community college, as he will enroll as a freshman at Grays Harbor this coming Fall.

"It's one last time to put on a high school uniform and just show everybody what you got out there," said Beers, who is attending GHCC for one reason -- because his brother is going to be assistant coaching there."

And Beers had three good pitches all working against the South all-stars.

"A fastball, curveball, and a changeup," said Beers when asked his repertoire of pitches.

What's the competition like out here?

"It's the best of the best," said Beers. "I think our league (North) is the best in the state."

It was pretty good. One of the North teams got to the 4A state title (Kentlake) in a game just played May 24, a loss to Snohomish, 10-1, after beating Richland, 5-4, in a great comeback.

But that is stepping back to other things, and, in this thing, Federal Way Eagle Mike Vlahovich hit 2-for-3 with a double and RBI and Shane Elliot went 1-for-3 with a double.

Looking at these two players' seasons, and, some others in the blue and white, Elliot was a top hitter of head coach Danny Graham's Eagles, batting around a .400 season average, and, Vlahovich led the team in RBI with 16 along with Justin Southern at .364. Elliot hit four home runs while Southern had one and Vlahovich one. Elliot notched 13 RBI and Southern five.

The TJ side of the North, besides Beers, was Derek Voigt. Both, along with Southern, will attend a good baseball school, Linfield, in college.

"It's fun to watch the kids move on and further their education," said Jerry Peterson, not talking of Voigt and Beers likely, but the Titans head baseball coach was speaking of two players he had in this all star game - Justin Lee and Sean Goforth. Goforth pitched two good innings for the South in the second game. More pitching from him and they may have won the nightcap game.

But this game was fun and a time to get to be rewarded for seasons well done. Like, Voigt, hitting .435 with 13 runs scored and 9 RBI to go with some solid pitching efforts. That included against FW where he got the save of a close, 9-8, mid-season game.

The Eagles lost all but one of their first half SPSL North games, but went on to have a good second half for Graham. They won six of their final eight games, including six in a row before a close 4-3 loss to Kentlake. And we already know how good KL was this season and Jefferson, 5-1. But still the run of wins was merit enough for the Eagles to get to the SPSL Playoffs where they lost to Curtis, 7-5, to end their season one shy of making the 4A state playoffs.

Beamer traveled a similar road, and, let's say quickly that players out here like Southern, Vlahovich, Elliot, Voigt, Ashton, Goforth and Lee were big reasons why their teams came back from bad first halves.

A little foretelling there, but Beamer, too, like Federal Way, had a mediocre start in the SPSL South. They were 2-2 in their first four games before rattling off six straight wins and seven of their last 10 to make the playoffs.

Coach Peterson contributed that turn toward success from a so-so start to his players, like Lee and Goforth.

"Justin and Sean did great but there were other seniors, too, like Zach Dzingle and Paul Cone that also did an outstanding job," said Peterson. "It was a great year, second in the SPSL South."

Peterson has taken the Titans baseball team to the district playoffs four of his five years coaching, and Beamer has only been a high school five years.

"I couldn't have asked for anything more," said Peterson. "The highlight was the seniors, they did a great job for the program."

So it goes, and, it definitely is the end for the seniors like Goforth, who hit .359 with 17 runs scored and 10 RBI, and Lee, hitting .421 with 17 runs, three HRs and 21 RBI.

"Last high school game wearing this jersey," said Goforth, referring to the Beamer jersey. All players from their respective teams wore their jerseys to make this night a kaleidoscope of colors out on the ballfield in the twilight of this 3-4 hours of fun.

"This season was the best," said Lee. "We lost a lot of seniors from last year, lost players to academics."

But they battled through and showed the champions they are and hopefully will become in this game of baseball that has ended in high school. But will be beginning at college at another level, as Lee goes now to Central Washington University, hoping to walk on there. Sean will go elsewhere, to Green River Community College.

Others that played in this game and did well would be Decatur star pitcher, Justin Reed. He threw a couple good scoreless innings in the second game. He had a 3.29 ERA this season and teammate Alex Bailey had a 2.75 ERA.