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Los Alamitos players get ready for Thursday’s game with Esperanza. (Photos: Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone).
Los Alamitos High School’s baseball team capped a perfect run through the Ryan Lemmon Invitational, defeating Esperanza 7-1 Thursday afternoon on the final day of the 36-team tournament at the Great Park Stadium.
The Griffins finished 4-0 and certainly would have been in the running for being in the championship game in most years. But this year was like no other with a record number of rainouts on Saturday and Monday. Tournament officials, including director Dick Owens, focused on making up as many games as possible and no champion was declared.
The tournament, sponsored by Guy Lemmon’s Ryan Lemmon Foundation, was extended one day into Thursday to allow for more games.
“We got all four games in, that was kind of the big concern,” said Los Alamitos Coach Tony Fusco. “We were lucky and got to play Monday at home when a lot of people didn’t, if not we would be playing a doubleheader.
“They were all good games, we just had to take them one at a time. It’s nice to play every day, you can have a short memory if things don’t go well, next day you’re right out there.”
To see the slide show, click on the first photo:
Los Alamitos got solid efforts on the mound from starter Jason Reid, who pitched the first four innings, allowing one run and four hits. Trevor Vieira then pitched two shutout innings and Bryce Haynes finished up by blanking Esperanza in the seventh.
“That’s been the story of the games we’ve played all tournament,” Fusco said. “We’ve had good pitching and the timely hitting and played good defense, those are the big three things in any game, we did good this week.”
CJ Berthon led Los Al’s 10-hit attack with two hits and an RBI. He also scored two runs, reaching on a hit batter and a walk.
Los Alamitos scored two runs in the second inning. Berthon walked, Devon Porch singled and stole second. Sutton DeNinno walked to load the bases and Cole Belfanti earned a bases loaded walk to drive in the first run.
Jake Natori followed with an RBI single to put the Griffins ahead 2-0.
Los Alamitos (15-5) added four more runs in the third inning. Tyler Smith had a sacrifice fly and DeNinno drove in two runs with a double. Another run scored on a wild pitch.
Esperanza (8-11) scored its run in the fourth inning. Jacob Petropulos led off with a single, advanced to second on an error and scored on an RBI single by Riley Thomas.
Los Al added another run in the fourth on an RBI single by Berthon, capping a big day for the Griffins’ first baseman.
“He’s a great athlete and former football player,” Fusco said. “He’s just a big, strong kid and a good heads up baseball player and he swings hard and good things happen when you do that.”
Berthon was pleased to be able to contribute to the win.
“I think it was a really good game, everybody got on base, whether it was walks ,like Cole had a big walk with the bases loaded, a good at bat and Sutton had a nice double in the gap for an RBI, it was a good team win and our pitchers pitched very well as well, a lot of strikeouts and a lot of weak contact,” he said. “It was a great game.
“It was a great week, we played very well, we start league again next week, we have Edison twice and another game on Saturday, so hopefully we take this good momentum into next week.”
Petropulos led Esperanza offensively, going 2 for 3.
—-Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com
