The game is in extra innings, there’s two outs with runners on second and third, and the Demarini Dirty Dozen are one out away from beating the No. 1 team on the west coast to advance to the championship game of West Coast Nationals. Nine-year-old Kenyon Yovan, third baseman of the team, sets up in a defensive stance as his father, the head coach, watches on. Jacob Bennett is pitching, and Parker Kelly is catching.
Nearly a decade later, Yovan recalls the surprise “backdoor” pickoff play he and Parker had up their sleeves.
“‘Parker, you have a good arm,’” Yovan told him. “Throw the ball to the bag and I’ll do everything else.”
The pitch came in, an inside fastball. Kelly received it and launched a throw to third where Yovan tagged out the runner before he could get back to the bag, ending the game and sending the Dirty Dozen to the championship game.
The three players, now all members of the Oregon Ducks baseball team, look back on this moment as the start of what became a close friendship over the years. Although they did not all go to the same high school, they remained close throughout their prep baseball careers and chose to play college ball at Oregon, where the three could play important roles in the coming seasons.
“Since the beginning, they’ve always been like older brothers to me,” Yovan said. “Once I got here we didn’t lose a step; they’re showing me the ropes. It was a nice transition for me.”
Kelly and Bennett are both entering their sophomore seasons, while Yovan arrived in Eugene this year as a freshman.

“It’s been quite the times,” Kelly recalled. “It’s a blessing that we’re all here together now.”
 
Both Kelly and Yovan are two-way players, meaning they both pitch and can play the field and hit. Both were selected in the late rounds of the 2016 MLB Draft. 
Kelly has appeared in two games in 2017 — both as a pitcher — and thrown 3.2 innings, striking out five and giving up two runs on six hits. Yovan has pitched 7.2 scoreless innings and notched three hits and three RBI from the batter’s box.
Jacob Bennett joined the Ducks last season as a right-handed pitcher. He hasn’t made an appearance in 2017 yet, but he amassed a 2-0 record and struck out five batters in seven games as a freshman last season. An injury forced him to miss the last two months of the season.
Yovan has seen the most playing time of the three players at this point in the season, after stepping into the closer role due to a short-term injury to projected closer Brac Warren. So far in 2017 Yovan has recorded three saves. His first win for the Ducks came in their 5-4 victory over the Mississippi State Bulldogs.
“He’s looked the [closer] part and has done very well,” head coach George Horton said of Yovan.
The three players hope they can recreate the magic they had back in the West Coast Nationals tournament and help the Ducks get to their first College World Series since the reinstatement of the program in 2009.
Follow Zak Laster on Twitter @zlast3445