The Federal Way Eagle baseball team was one inning away from playing for the state championship.

But it wasn’t meant to be Friday night under a closed roof at Safeco Field in the Class 4A state semifinal against Kentwood. The Eagles, however, did come back Saturday afternoon to throttle Shorewood, 11-3, to claim third place.

Federal Way (19-6) belted three home runs at Safeco Field, including a pair by Austin Webber, and a solid six-inning pitching performance from senior right-hander TJ Horsfall to beat up the Thunderbirds, who lost to Richland Friday.

But it was Friday night’s 3-2 loss in the bottom of the seventh inning to the eventual state-champion Conquerors that hurts the most. It was the third time Kentwood had beaten the Eagles this season and the closest.

Trailing 2-1 with two outs in the bottom of the sixth inning, Kentwood’s Ben Cox blasted a pinch-hit triple off the 389-foot marker in right-center field, plating Matt Bell from first base and knotting the game 2-2. One inning later, Taylor White came through with a bases-loaded single to left-center field, scoring JT Evenson from third base and sealing Kentwood’s berth in Saturday night’s championship game.

Cox took a simple approach to his clutch at-bat in the sixth inning.

“I just didn’t think,” he said. “I just wanted to get up there and swing it like I can. (Teammate) Cash (McGuire) already told me before I hit, ‘Hey, just sit on a fastball because (Federal Way pitcher Elliot Morris) usually comes with it the first pitch.’ So I just sat on that first pitch.”

Early Friday evening, however, that state championship berth was in serious doubt.

Federal Way, which came in riding an 11-game winning streak, gave the Conquerors all they could handle.

“When we got here, a lot of people were saying, ‘You’re pretty happy to be here.’ I said, ‘No.’ We came to win,” said Federal Way coach Danny Graham. “To be honest, we came to win. We knew that Kentwood was awesome, they smashed us twice, but we felt we made the changes and had a lot more confidence.”

That confidence showed in the first inning, when shortstop Nick Tanielu ripped an RBI double off the left-field wall, giving the Eagles a 1-0 lead. Federal Way pushed its lead to 2-0 in the second on a pair of Kentwood errors.

Austin Voth, the South Puget Sound League North Division MVP, then took control on the mound for Kentwood, facing just nine batters over the next three innings. White, the Kentwood catcher, had a big part of keeping the number of batters Voth faced through the middle innings at a minimum, gunning down two Federal Way runners attempting to steal.

Voth went the distance on the mound, allowing just three hits and striking out eight.

“I knew my job today was to come out, get a win and throw strikes,” Voth said.

That said, Federal Way was a far different team than the one the Conquerors rolled over twice during the regular season.

“I feel like their hitting improved a lot this year from the first time I faced them to now,” Voth said.

Kentwood coach Jon Aarstad agreed.

“They have been unbelievable since we beat them earlier. They’re a completely different team,” Aarstad said. “It’s like black and white.”

Indeed it was. And much of that came thanks to a strong performance on the mound from Federal Way ace Elliot Morris, who handcuffed Kentwood through six innings.

Kentwood didn’t break through against Elliot until the third inning, when Bryant VanEngelenburg pushed home Oak with an RBI single up the middle. Morris stranded a pair of Kentwood runners in the fourth and the fifth innings, but wasn’t able to duplicate the feat in the sixth, when Cox delivered his pinch-hit triple. Cox’s hit came within an eyelash of clearing the right-center fence.

“He’s got pop. He’s got a lot of pop,” Aarstad said of Cox. “He really is a really good hitter. It’s just a weapon that we have, another one we can throw out there.”

Cox’s big hit allowed White to seal the deal an inning later. Evenson led off the seventh with a four-pitch walk. VanEngelenburg followed with a free pass, putting runners on first and second with Voth, Kentwood’s cleanup hitter, at bat. Voth sacrificed Evenson and VanEngelenburg up a base, allowing Graham to choose to intentionally walk Kentwood’s Avery Kain.

The move, however, didn’t pay off as White ripped the third pitch he saw into left field.

“I knew he was going to throw a fastball down the middle, so I pulled it,” White said. “It was awesome. It’s my favorite feeling in the whole wide world.”

Federal Way 11, Shorewood 3 (third-fourth game)

The Eagles jumped all over Shorewood Saturday afternoon at Safeco Field and never looked back to claim the third-place trophy.

Federal Way tallied two runs in the top of the first, two more in the third, three in the fourth and four in the fifth. Webber was the hitting hero during the game, belting two home runs and finishing with four RBIs.

But Horsfall did damage on the mound and in the batter’s box. The senior struck out six in six innings of work and also had a three-run home run.

His only hiccup on the mound came in the third inning, when Shorewood scored their only three runs of the game. The Thunderbirds managed just four hits.

Federal Way junior Drew Cratsenberg finished 2 for 3 with a run and an RBI.

Federal Way Mirror sports editor Casey Olson contributed to this report.