Prep roundup: Livermore shocks third-ranked Amador Valley in baseball
Menlo-Atherton needs 12 innings to beat Carlmont. Foothill rolls past Dublin. James Logan cools off Washington-Fremont. In softball, Pinole Valley improves to 18-0.
Baseball
Livermore stuns No. 3 Amador Valley
Livermore coach David Perotti figured his team was going to have some growing pains this season. The Cowboys had only five seniors on the roster, and not all of them started.
Then injuries struck, and a 5-0 start quickly evaporated into 10 losses in their next 13 games. But the Cowboys showed on Wednesday they are better than their overall record, as they shocked Amador Valley, the No. 3 team in the Bay Area News Group Top 20. The final score was 2-1.
Ray Castillo, who has struggled to keep his batting average above .200, singled home the game’s first run with a single in the top of the fourth, then he hit a sacrifice fly in the sixth that snapped a 1-1 tie.
Pitchers CJ Johnstone and Josh Rodriguez did the rest, allowing two hits and striking out nine. Johnston went the first five innings for the win, and Rodriguez got the save.
“CJ struggles with his command a little,” Perotti said, “but he can be a bear of an at-bat when he’s throwing well. Rodriguez has a good curveball, and he just pounds the (strike) zone.”
Amador Valley is 13-4 overall, with all four defeats coming against East Bay Athletic League opponents. That puts the Dons sixth in the league standings but fourth in the Valley Division. The top three teams in each division qualify for the league playoffs.
Amador gets a chance for revenge with a visit to Livermore (1-7 in league play) on Friday.
No. 17 Menlo-Atherton 6, Carlmont 1, 12 innings
If pitching duels are your thing, the Peninsula Athletic League Bay Division battle between Menlo-Atherton and Carmont would have been very satisfying.
Ryan Robson drove in pinch-runner Brian Cooke to give Carlmont a 1-0 lead in the home half of the fifth, then UC Santa Barbara commit Rowan Kelly homered in the sixth for the tie. That concluded the scoring until the 12th.
Trevor Heinz drove in the go-ahead run on a fielder’s choice ground ball, and Jimmy Zaharias drove in two more with a base hit.
The pitching was pretty spectacular for both sides. For M-A, Thomas Scott worked the first five innings, Noah Whittaker pitched the next four, then Texas-bound George Zaharias worked the final three innings and picked up the win.
On the other side, Carlmont starter Tyler Pechetti went seven innings and Jack Wiessinger finished up. Only two of the five runs he allowed were earned.
Menlo-Atherton now sits at 12-5 overall and 6-0 in the PAL Bay. The Bears lead Burlingame (5-2) by a game and a half.
Carlmont (7-11, 3-4) really has no one but itself to blame for this defeat, if the MaxPreps stats are accurate. The Scots allowed M-A’s winning run to come home on an error. They outhit the Bears 9-4. And they had eight stolen bases.
No. 13 Foothill 9, No. 7 Dublin 0
History shows that every team is going to hit the skids during the course of a season. Dublin is in one now.
The Gaels (13-5) started the season 12-2 but have lost three of their last four. They have been outscored 20-3 in those contests and haven’t scored at all in their last two defeats.
Foothill scored at least one run in each of the first five innings for an easy victory. Sophomore Landon Comerford homered and had four RBI. St. Mary’s College-bound infielder Brendan Comerford was 3 for 3, scored twice and drove in a run. Jack Fowler, another sophomore, had two hits and two RBI.
Meanwhile, right-hander Tyler Gebb was on top of his game, allowing four hits over six innings and lowering his ERA to 1.40.
Foothill is 11-6 and 5-4 in the EBAL, tied for fourth with Dublin. The two teams meet again on Friday at Dublin.
No. 9 San Ramon Valley 9, Dougherty Valley 5
The host Wolves led 8-0 after two innings. Dougherty Valley closed it to four runs in the sixth but could get no closer.
San Ramon Valley mounted a 13-hit attack, with Luke Baker, Jakes Dommes, Colin Linteo and Joseph Coupland getting two apiece. Coupland, Julian Cambra and Blake Jacobs each drove in two runs. Dommes scored three runs.
SRV finds itself all alone in third place in the EBAL at 5-3, second behind De La Salle in the Mountain Division. The Wolves are 13-6 overall.
No. 10 Los Gatos 9, Wilcox 4
Los Gatos cruised to an early 6-0 lead, Wilcox sliced it in half in the home half of the fourth, then the visitors added three more runs. The Wildcats scored in all but the first and seventh innings.
Catcher/utility player Drew Dillehay, who is headed to Cal State-Fullerton, had three hits including a double, scored two runs, and drove in another as Los Gatos improved to 7-0 in the SCVAL De Anza Division. The Wildcats hold a two-game lead over Los Altos.
Jake Boyd and Brayden Smith also drove in two runs. Smith, a sophomore, leads the Cats with a .400 average.
Wilcox is 10-8 overall and 4-3 in league play.
No. 15 Berkeley 8, Arroyo 1
It was a competitive game until Berkeley scored four times in the seventh to break it open. The Yellowjackets (10-4, 4-1 WACC-Foothill) and Alameda are tied for first place. Alameda rolled past Castro Valley 8-2 on Wednesday.
Trey Johnson led Berkeley’s offense, going 4-for-4 with two RBI. Junior Manny Selles drove in four runs with a homer and single.
Burlingame 3, No. 20 Capuchino 2
The Panthers scored single runs in the first, second and fourth, then held on to win.
Aidan Alfers, Lukas Habelt and Luca Scatena each had an RBI for the winners. Alfers and Scatena combined on a two-hitter on the mound. Scatena was the winning pitcher and Alfers earned the save. Capuchino had two hits.
The Mustangs have lost four of five, all in Peninsula Bay Division play. At 3-4, they are 3½ games behind first-place Menlo-Atherton.
Burlingame is 10-3 overall and 5-2 in league contests.
James Logan 8, Washington-Fremont 5
The visiting Colts slowed down a red-hot Washington team that had won five in a row including a victory over St. Francis last week.
Logan never trailed, but it couldn’t put away the Huskies, either. After the Colts built an 8-3 advantage with a five-run sixth, the Huskies scored two in the bottom of the inning to keep the game in reach.
Trevian Martinez had two hits for James Logan, including a two-run double. Daniel Hernandez drove in three runs with a double and single. He was also the winning pitcher, starting and going 5⅓ innings.
Both teams have identical 10-6 overall records, but Logan had a 1½-game edge in the Mission Valley Athletic League at 7-0. Washington is 5-1.
Elsewhere
Evergreen Valley and Gilroy are tied for first at 5-1 in the Blossom Valley Athletic League Santa Teresa Division after both teams won on Wednesday while Prospect (5-2) was upset by Silver Creek. Evergreen Valley scored 10 unanswered runs after falling behind 3-1 in the fourth. Gregory Strite doubled, tripled and drove in three for EV. … Silver Creek rallied from a 6-1 deficit to knock Prospect out of the top spot in the Santa Teresa standings. Noah Medina had three hits and plated three runs for the Raiders (1-5), who won their first league encounter. Silver Creek is young. It had only one senior in its starting lineup. … St. Mary’s-Berkeley remained undefeated in the TCAL Rock. The Panthers (12-4-1, 7-0-1) edged St. Patrick-St. Vincent 4-3 with a run in the bottom of the seventh. Marley Filson had three hits and an RBI. … American made six errors but still beat Newark Memorial 8-1 in the Mission Valley Athletic League. Down 6-4 after five innings, the Eagles scored twice in the sixth and two more in the seventh. Sophomores Dillon Hsiao and Carson Rice, and junior Calen Morgan combined for six hits and four RBI. American is 4-3 in the MVAL. … Freshman Darren Olson pitched six innings of one-hit ball and sophomore Anthony Wilson pitched a scoreless seventh as Encinal beat San Leandro 2-0. Encinal (5-0) has a one-game lead over the Pirates in the West Alameda County Conference Shoreline.
Softball
No. 4 Pinole Valley 10, El Cerrito 0
The Spartans improved to 18-0 with an easy TCAL Rock Division win over El Cerrito, Pinole Valley is 7-0 in league play while El Cerrito is 3-9, 0-6.
The Spartans led 9-0 after two innings. Kailani Tatro pitched a complete-game one-hitter, issuing no walks and striking out nine in five innings. Pinole Valley stole 13 bases against the Gauchos, with Milanya Rosales and freshman Ayla Serrano each swiping three.
There are six games left in the regular season for Pinole, with the toughest possibly a non-league contest at Maria Carrillo-Santa Rosa (9-2) on May 5.
Elsewhere
Arroyo scored a run in the bottom of the eighth to beat Castro Valley 2-1. Isabelle Reyes and Liyana Williams each had two hits and an RBI for the Dons. Maila Bromstead went the distance for Arroyo, allowing four hits. Arroyo is 4-1 in the West Alameda County Conference Foothill Division, a half-game behind co-leaders San Leandro and Alameda. … The Alameda Hornets pushed their record to 9-4 overall and 4-0 in league by beating Berkeley 5-1. Jasmine Whorley got the save with three innings of hitless relief. She struck out seven. Starting pitcher Ashlie Nakano worked the first four innings and got the win, She struck out six. Freshman Leaira Robinson drove home two runs. … De Anza (9-3, 7-0 TCAL Stone) got a six-inning no-hitter from Mya Arroyo in an 11-1 win against Vallejo. She walked four and stuck out 13. … Terra Nova edged South San Francisco and is now tied for first with Half Moon Bay in the PAL Ocean Division. Gianna Tassio was a one-player wrecking crew. The senior was 3-for-3 with three RBI at the plate. On the mound she went all seven innings, allowing two hits, walking four and striking out 15. … Aragon senior Brooke Tran fired a complete-game five-hitter in a 4-2 non-league win over Los Gatos. Tran struck out 12. Aragon improved to 6-9. Los Gatos is 10-6. … Monte Vista improved to 5-1 in the EBAL by beating Dougherty Valley 14-4. The Mustangs trail co-leaders San Ramon Valley and Granada, both 6-1, by one-half game in the league standings. Angelina Betti had three hits and four RBI for the winners. … Mills freshman Audrey Jang ripped four doubles and drove in six runs during the Vikings’ 15-0 rout of El Camino. The game was called after four innings.