CONCORD, Calif. – The top seed in the top division of the first year of the CIF Northern Regional baseball playoffs didn’t play its best game of the season. However, despite a couple of gaffes the De La Salle batters had their hitting shoes on and rode a six-run first inning to a Tuesday evening 9-3 victory in the quarterfinals of the inaugural CIF Northern Regional Division I baseball playoffs.
CIF North Coast Section Division I champion De La Salle (25-6) had two runners caught stealing and hit into two double plays with all four situations ending rallies. They also had a couple of errors in the field.
On a positive note the Spartans banged out 10 hits, had five walks and a hit batter. The visiting Cougars had 10 hits as well, with two walks and a hit batter, and runners on base in every inning, but a big difference was while De La Salle only left seven runners on base in scoring nine runs, CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division 3 champion Del Campo stranded 12 runners.
“We jumped on them early,” De la Salle head coach David Jeans remarked. “We had a good first inning but we didn’t execute and we did some things that were uncharacteristic that you just can’t do in the playoffs but we got by with that six run inning and then some tougher pitching.”
“They’re a good team, well-coached, they put runners on and put pressure on us every inning,” Jeans continued. “The game of baseball is never easy. It never seems like we had an easy inning today. We’ll learn from it but we’ll take the W.”
De La Salle starting pitcher Tyler Wood gave up a single to lead off the game but after the senior right-hander stranded him at second the Spartans responded big=-time in the bottom half of the first frame.
Senior second-baseman Alec Nava (2-for-4, two RBI, one run, stolen base) singled to open the inning and promptly sole second. Junior Tanner Griffith walked and the two runners advanced on a balk by Del Campo senior starting pitcher Hayden Hughes. Up stepped UC Irvine-bound senior catcher Anthony Martinez. After he blasted a foul ball that went over the houses beyond the right field fence, Hughes wanted no part of him and walked Martinez to load the bases.
San Jose State-bound senior third-baseman Cade Cushing then crushed a double that drove in Nava and Griffith and sent Martinez to third. Junior first-baseman Connor Harris then his a hot smash to third that was mishandled and he got an RBI for driving in Martinez and Cushing came around to score from second on the error. The sixth run came when UC San Diego-committed senior shortstop Donavan Chriss doubled and came around on an RBI single by senior centerfielder Ethan Dungo.
Del Campo (29-6) answered back to make it 6-1 with a run in the second when senior Logan McCord doubled and scored on an RBI single by junior Robbie Perry.
The Spartans matched that run to make it 7-1 after three innings when Harrison got plunked to open the bottom of the third, stole second, and was plated on an RBI double by senior designated hitter Elias Rubio.
Wood got the win to get to 8-0 on the season but after he gave up a single to Tyler Moore to open the fifth, Jeans took the ball and handed it to junior Sam Sitzman. He gave up a single to the Cougars’ Anthony Martinez and then a double to senior Logan that scored both runners. At that point Jeans went to sophomore Jack Hershey and he got a strikeout to end the inning.
After De La Salle went in order in the bottom of the fifth and Hershey gave up a single but had two strikeouts to close out the top of the sixth, De La Salle added two runs in the bottom of the frame.
Rubio walked to open the inning and Dungo doubled to put runners on second and third. Nava then stroked a single to drive in the pair and the game’s final tally.
“Yes, it was kind of a sloppy game,” said Martinez, who despite not getting much to hit was on base all four at bats with a double he legged out in the fourth, a single and two walks. “We put up six in the first and the energy kind of died and we kind of went into cruise mode.”
“Going forward we can’t have that,” Martinez continued. “We’re going to face better teams like we have Foothill coming up and if we do that they might take the game away from us o we have to come ready on Thursday.”
Fourth-seeded Foothill (26-5) set up a fourth meeting between the East Bay Athletic League arch rivals with a 15-5 rout of No. 5 seed Palo Alto on Tuesday in Pleasanton.
De La Salle won the first meeting in Pleasanton in late April, lost at home in mid-May, and then won 9-6 in nine-innings last Friday on the road in the NCS Division I title game.
This match-up will be in Concord and an interesting twist is that is where the visiting Falcons had their one win.
