What happens during the regular season can prove completely irrelevant in the postseason, a fact exemplified by Spanish Fork baseball during its remarkable postseason run.

With the 5A state championship final series on tap, the Dons find themselves as one of the two teams left standing despite being tabbed a No. 20 seed prior to the tournament. It’s a level of seeding that rarely advances past the first round of any tournament competition, let alone clear to the finals of a double-elimination format.

“No one expected us to be here, but it was not unexpected from our end,” said Spanish Fork Coach Hadley Thorpe. “It’s a testament to our team and their approach. Our motto this season has been, ‘Til’ the end,’ and that’s the approach we’ve had with every game and it’s carried into the postseason.”

The Dons will square off against No. 2-seeded Brighton with play beginning on Friday and extending until Saturday in the best of three series. It’s a type of position that seemed almost laughable to think as possible as recently as a month and a half ago as Thorpe’s team struggled to a 2-11 start to the season.

“We were talking as coaches the other night, sort of laughing when thinking about where we were back then, but truly believing, even then, that we could still turn it around,” Thorpe related. “We had some early injuries, but we kept telling our players to keep putting themselves in spots to win and eventually it’s going to start happening.”

And what better time for it to happen than when it matters most?

“We got our key guys back from injury and we’ve been able to develop a deep pitching staff,” Thorpe said. “So all of that has really helped prepare us for what we’ve been able to do so far in this tournament.”

Spanish Fork didn’t exactly end the season as a team you could easily tab as one capable of reaching the final round without a loss. Indeed the Dons won just three of their final seven games of the regular season, but kept their collective heads up, believed in the process, and made sure to improve with every game played.

Particularly notable about Spanish Fork’s run has been their two wins over defending State Champion and No. 1 seed Maple Mountain. Despite losing twice to the Golden Eagles by convincing margins in the regular season, the Dons came on top of their crosstown rivals, winning a 5-2 in bracket play on Monday before taking a thrilling 6-5 extra inning win on Wednesday night to advance to the final round.

“Maple Mountain is truly one of the all-time great Utah teams,” Thorpe appraised. “We have tremendous respect for that program, but we had the benefit of seeing them twice in the regular season and we knew what they had. We also knew that we were a totally different team now when we played them last, so that was an advantage that worked for us.”

But Thorpe doesn’t aim to rest on his team’s remarkable accomplishment of simply advancing to the final round of play. He, along with his team intends on completing the journey.

“It’s going to be a big test for sure,” Thorpe said. “Brighton has a really good pitching staff, they hit it well from the plate and it’s going to be our toughest challenge yet. But we just need to keep focusing on us and what we do well and hope for the best.”