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St. John Bosco players from left Carlos Barajas, Jaden Jackson and Noah Everly celebrate after Thursday’s win. (PHOTOS: Tom Connolly, For OC Sports Zone).
Top-seeded St. John Bosco broke out to a comfortable lead and then had to fend off visiting Villa Park before winning 7-4 in Thursday’s semifinal baseball game of the CIF So Cal Regional Division I tournament.
Thursday’s contest was a rematch of the CIF Division 1 semifinal playoff game which the Braves defeated the Spartans 4-3 in nine innings.
St. John Bosco went on to capture its first CIF baseball championship in school history last Friday with a 3-2 victory over Santa Margarita. The Braves are ranked No. 1 in the Southern Section, No. 1 in California, and No. 3 in the nation.
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No. 5 seeded Villa Park was attempting to advance to the school’s first So Cal regional final. The Spartans dealt previously undefeated Granite Hills of San Diego its first loss of the season in an opening round game on Tuesday. Villa Park won 12 of their last 15 games and finish the season 25-8.
The Braves (29-4) advance to Saturday’s championship game and will host Patrick Henry of San Diego, which defeated Crespi in the other semifinal on Thursday. St. John Bosco has won 18 consecutive games and improved its record to 15-1 at home.
Spartans Coach Burt Call said his team came up a little short.
“Looking back at the season we had a championship attitude all year,” said Call. “We played hard. We came up against a really talented team and we had a chance to win but we just came up a little short. We look forward to next year. We are losing some key players, but we will be very competitive. We have some very good players coming back and some JV kids who are ready to move up.”
St. John Bosco took an early lead.
Jaden Jackson singled with one out in the bottom of the first inning and moved to second on an infield ground out. The speedy UCLA-commit stole third base and scored on Moises Razo’s infield RBI single, giving the Braves a 1-0 lead.
In the top of the second inning, Villa Park took advantage of a pair of St. John Bosco infield errors and tied the score at 1-1 on Jake Nobles RBI sacrifice fly.
The Braves pushed across four runs in the third inning to take a 5-1 lead. The first two St. John Bosco hitters in the inning, Aaron Garcia, and James Clark, drew walks. Jackson then blasted an RBI double off the left center field fence.
“I was surprised how far it went; I didn’t think it had a chance to go over the fence; it just kept carrying,” said Jackson. “We feed off Villa Park’s energy; us seniors were here when we were 1-14 and we flipped it in two years and the growth has been amazing.”
Moments later in the inning, Noah Everly drilled a two-run double in nearly the same spot as Jackson’s double, upping the Braves lead to 4-1. After Everly moved to third on an infield ground out, he scored on a passed ball and the Braves led 5-1.
The Spartans countered with three runs in the top of the fourth inning, highlighted by Nate Lewis’ RBI single and a controversial RBI single by Austin Park.
With two outs and a runner at third, Park hit a ball sharply down the first base line that appeared to be a fair ball. After passing the first base bag, the ball hit the first base umpire, who was positioned several feet behind first base in foul territory.
The ball caromed off the umpire into short right field, allowing Ezra Santillo to score from third and cutting the lead to 5-4.
The first base umpire called the ball dead and sent the runner back to third. Call came onto the field to question the umpire’s decision. The three umpires then huddled for several minutes and ruled the ball was fair and since the umpire was positioned behind the fielder when the ball hit him, the ball was ruled a live ball, allowing Santillo to score.
If the umpire had been in front of the fielder and the ball hit him, the ball would have been called a dead ball, and the runner would have been sent back to third base.
The Braves added two insurance runs in the seventh inning on RBI by Jack Champlin and Aiden Olguin. Champlin came on in relief and shut down the Spartans in their final at bat to secure the win and advance to Saturday’s championship game.
“It’s incredible what this team has been able to do in the last two years and that’s go to four championship games,” said St. John Bosco Coach Andy Rojo. “I told our guys before the game that Burt Call is one of the greatest coaches around and if we let these guys hang around, they’ll take advantage of it. We went up 5-1 and they came back and made it a close game. I think that shows character for both teams.”
Notes:
– –Villa Park catcher and team captain Shawn Romero was injured on a play at the plate in the sixth inning. He tried to continue to play but left the game. “I’ve had a leg injury for the last few weeks that I’ve played through. I reinjured it on the play at home in the sixth inning. I’ll take a few days off and then get back into playing on my travel team. I could not be prouder of this team. People had low expectations for us, and we exceeded what everybody thought we would do.”
—St. John Bosco defeated St. Augustine 2-1 in the first round of the tournament, while Villa Park defeated Granite Hills in an opening round game.
—-The Braves stole seven bases on Thursday.
—Romero is committed to play at Pepperdine University next season.
—-St. John Bosco has numerous players who are committed to play college baseball next year: Jaden Jackson (UCLA), Carlos Barajas (University of Rochester), Phillip Swinford III (Willamette University), Jhett Ohira (USC), Jacob Vasquez (Nicholls State), Macade Maxwell (Holy Cross), James Clark (Princeton), Aiden Olguin (Buena Vista College), A.J. Sciarra (Whittier College), Miles Clark (Princeton), Moises Razo (Fresno State), Trevor Heishman (Memphis).
—St. John Bosco’s Athletic Director, Vince Bown, son, Zack, played for Burt Call at Villa Park.
—-Villa Park pitching coach Pat Fitzsimons and Spartans AD, Tim Fox, attended St. John Bosco High School.