BROOKINGS — Clark Area pulled off an upset to open the state tournament.

No. 8 Clark Area topped No. 1 West Central, 4-2, in the quarterfinals of the Class B State High School baseball tournament Monday at Bob Shelden Field.

The Dinosaurs will play at 10 a.m. Tuesday in the state semifinals.

“It’s awesome,” said Clark Area coach Chris Bokinskie. “Being the 8-seed, the underdog, and prove we belong here. The northeast area wasn’t well known for their high school teams, isn’t real well known for their baseball in general. But we’ve gone to several state tournaments with this group and this puts the cherry on the cake.”

The Dinosaurs put together a three-run seventh inning combined with a complete game outing by starter Watson Grantham to pull off the stunner.

“It was a great win, we rolled into it,” said Grantham. “We had practice yesterday and going into it, we’re the 8-seed and everyone was counting us out. We know how good we are because we came out today and came down to it, took the game in the end.”

Down to its final out in the seventh inning, CA’s Jakob Steen lined a single back into center field, scoring Cooper Pommer to tie the game at 2-2. But it was Damian Severson’s two-RBI-single to give the Dinosaurs its first lead of the game.

Clark Area's Damian Severson celebrates after hitting the go-ahead RBI-single in the Class B state quarterfinals against West Central on May 25, 2026, at Bob Shelden Field in Brookings. (Jon Akre / 605 Sports)

“Those guys had been hitting the ball so I felt like we had a chance yet,” Bokinskie said. “Didn’t roll over and die and those guys came up, hit the ball and you're just excited trying to get guys scoring and put pressure on them, and make them make the throws.”

With a 4-2 lead, Grantham forced a ground out before back-to-back K’s to seal the upset win.

“We started getting some runners on and big people came up in big spots,” Grantham said. “It was a complete zero to 100 and we rode that into the bottom of the seventh and just did our jobs.

“It felt great, it felt really great. West Central is a really great team, they do everything right, but it’s always great to knock the No. 1 seed off.”

Monday’s Memorial Day opener started with two early runs by the Trojans. Beckett Everson tallied a ground out to plate a runner in the opening frame before adding a single to score another in the third inning.

Grantham scored the first Dinosaur run on a ground out in the fourth inning while settling in on the mound, shutting out WC the rest of the game.

“I knew they were a team that was going to put the ball in play,” Grantham said. “They scored two on me early and I was kind of down on myself but I knew that I had to go the distance for our team, knowing we plan on making it to tomorrow. Throwing strikes across the plate, and letting them put the ball in play.”

Grantham allowed just two runs on three hits and a walk in 90 pitches, striking out nine Trojan batters.

“It was huge,” Bokinskie said of Grantham’s pitching. “I’ve told our kids, our coaching staff all year, I will take that kid against anyone in the state and he’s going to give you a chance. He went out there and he dominated. Mentally, he owned the game and that was huge. He knew what had to be done, he put the team on his back.”

Severson totaled two RBIs on two hits and a walk while Steen tallied an RBI on one hit in the win.

For WC, CJ Den Boer suffered the loss, surrendering three runs on three hits and a walk in one inning pitched.

Everson had two RBIs on one hit while Zach Lorang and Hayden Whiting each tallied hits in the loss.

Clark Area will face the Vermillion vs Platte-Geddes/Dakota Christian/White Lake winner at 10 a.m. on Tuesday.

“We still got some really good pitching available,” Bokinskie said. “Our defense has been spectacular. I think these kids’ mentality of the game will keep us rolling through the semifinals. They’ve been preparing for this for two weeks and I think they’ve finally got it figured out on how to mentally prepare and take care of business.”

“We just got to keep everything at a high level,” Grantham said. “Go home today, don’t do anything dumb. Come out, mentality has to be high. We just got to play at the same level we did today.”