White River High’s baseball squad allowed a golden opportunity to possibly tie for the top spot in the South Puget Sound League 3A standings to slip through its fingers Thursday when it was edged 5-4 in eight innings at Enumclaw.

After Sumner had suffered its first defeat to nemesis Bonney Lake earlier in the week, dropping it’s league mark to 6-1, White River saw its record fall to 5-2, remaining a step behind the Spartans.

“It wasn’t like we were paying all that much attention to the standings because we really do take them one game at a time,” White River coach Mike Williams said. “What was disappointing against Enumclaw, though, was the fact that we stranded 11 base runners.

“Not to make any excuses, because Enumclaw is a great team, but we were really kind of out of sync, because that was only our third game over a 15-day span and we had been practicing in our gym all during the spring break due to the lousy weather.”

White River should be able to get back into the swing of things this week as the Hornet nine is slated to play four consecutive contests.

White River’s full dance card began Tuesday when the Hornets traveled to Peninsula High. Today, Wednesday, White River hosts a winless Clover Park contingent, Thursday brings a makeup rendezvous with league-leading Sumner and Friday has the Hornets on the road to play Auburn Mountainview.