1995 OHS baseball team makes history with outstanding season

By Ray Rodriguez
Argus Observer
Saturday, August 16, 2008 10:23 PM PDT

The 1995 state championship baseball trophy stands alone in the trophy case at Ontario High School. The Tigers clinched the state title in a 4-0 win over Brookings-Harbor.

Ontario — Led by the state’s Most Valuable Player, Greg Garza, head coach Brian Hoffman, assistant coach Jerry Gray and a 22-year old assistant coach Dave Parsons, the 1995 Ontario baseball team slashed and dashed through state competition with its first and only state championship, making it one of the most notable sporting events in Ontario’s history.

With a roster of brainiacs in Josh Dalton, Luke Fritts, Ryder Holderman, Carl Grovner, brothers Jason and Josh Wood, Ben Peterson and Brian Redman, the Tigers amassed 25 wins and clinched a league title that season before advancing to state to make history.

In the first state tournament game, Ontario walloped Stayton by a 25-2 margin and kept the run going in the quarterfinals with a 4-0 win over La Salle.

In the semifinals, the Tigers slipped past a pesky Douglas squad and earned a spot in the championship game against Brookings-Harbor.

In the final game, Fritts hit an inside-the-park home run, and Garza tossed a complete game to seal the 4-0 win at Civic Stadium in Portland.

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The 1995 season was memorable in many ways for Parsons.

Parsons, who was just starting his long run as a coach at Ontario, learned the many in-depth details of what it takes to be a successful coach from Hoffman.

“He was the type of coach where every kid on the team absolutely loved him,” Parsons said. “He was the consummate cheerleader. He wanted everyone to be happy and fired up about baseball.”

Just four years later in the winter of 1999, Hoffman died of a heart attack from complications from Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma.

 “I talk about Hoffman all the time. Here I was just a snot-nosed kid fresh out of college, and he put the confidence in me. I still use those lessons of how to take care of kids, and how you used them throughout the season. He was great guy.”

Another highlight for Parsons was a game at home against Burns, where Garza stole the show. In that game, he threw a no-hitter and hit for the cycle to lead the Tigers to the win.

In his final at-bat, Garza, a right-hander, cracked a bomb all the way to the wall. Instead of racing around the bases, he stopped at second base for the two-bagger to complete the rare feat.

Many of the stars of 1995 still live in the area. Dalton serves as a deputy district attorney, and Holderman is a veterinarian. The Wood brothers are part of Boston Beef, and Peterson is a doctor.

“The two things I say about this team is they went on to be special people. They didn’t live off that memory,” Parsons said. “They are good carriers of the future, and they still contribute to the community that brought them up. They all went on to good things. They were all smart kids, they all supported each other and when it was game time, they were good friends.”