Tracy Press

Chavez High avenges an earlier loss against the Bulldogs, while West shuts down McNair.

 Tracy High’s Bobby Agard rips a single during Friday’s defeat against Chavez in Tracy. Glenn Moore/Tracy Press

The Titans took advantage of five walks in the sixth inning and five more in the seventh to take the 8-3 win at Tracy High.

Through the fourth inning, starting pitcher Daniel Heefner didn’t allow any hits, and two hits in the fifth didn’t cost the Bulldogs anything as another batter smacked the ball right at Heefner, who turned to shortstop Stevie Ramos at second for the first leg of a double play that was completed by Vince Canale at first.

But the Titans drew three walks in a row off Heefner, took a walk and a two-run single off reliever Bret Maddox, and stole home and drove in another run after Preston Mattos came in.

The Titans, who are now 1-5 in the San Joaquin Athletic Association, proved both Wednesday and Friday that they can hit and field effectively.

"Our record doesn’t show it, but the way we played today is the way we play all of our games," Chavez coach Pete Gallegos said. "If you stick in there and keep your head up and play hard baseball every time you go out there, things will go your way."

Tracy coach Vic Alkire gave Chavez credit for a well-played game.

"They battle. They really do," he said. "The pressure and situations of the game got to us."

Chavez pitcher Antonio Field threw all seven innings. Tracy collected seven hits, including Ramos’ leadoff triple and two base hits from Ricky Diaz, who just moved up Friday from the sophomore team. Bobby Agard also got two hits, as did Justin Evans and B.J. O’Bryan. But Tracy also left nine runners on base.

Tracy is now 5-1 in the SJAA, 18-4 overall.

West’s Ryan Devencenzi throws a pitch during his shutout of McNair on Friday. Glenn Moore/Tracy Press

Ryan Devencenzi gave up one hit in five innings, plus a walk and a hit batter Friday.

But two of those baserunners were rendered ineffective by a timely Josh Thomassen-to-Riley Goulding-to-Tyler Shepherd double play.

The win puts West at 6-0 in the Tri-City Athletic League and 15-7 overall.

West coach Jim Rice said his batters were able to take advantage of McNair’s inconsistent pitching in the first inning as Shepherd, Matt Fontaine, Mike Wentz and Derek Oetken started the game with a string of hits. C.J. Parilla walked, and Thomassen came up for the second time that inning to drive in two for a seven-run inning.

"When they did get it over the plate, we were finding holes in their defense," Rice said.

In all, West had nine hits, including three from Fontaine, who batted in four West runs, and two from Oetken.

Brookside Christian 18, Millennium 5

There were some encouraging signs in Millennium High’s 18-5 loss to Brookside Christian at home Thursday.

The Falcons showed that they can get clutch hits and score runs. They also showed that, even trailing 10-1 going into the fifth inning, they can play the game one batter — and one hit — at a time.

Cody Nelson and Mark LaRue got on base with walks, and Kellen Cheadle loaded the bases with a shot past the Brookside third baseman.

Johnathan Beringer got his second of three base hits for the day when he came up with a shot to right-center to drive in Nelson and LaRue and send Cheadle to third.

The Falcons got two more in the sixth when Brandon Haynes and LaRue drove in runs.

"We were happy with the way we’re hitting the ball," assistant coach Drew Reyes said, adding that Millennium mustered only two hits against Brookside on Tuesday but got eight in all Thursday.

"We got a little momentum and got some timely hits. We just need to string together a few more hits in a row."

Though the Knights rallied late, Reyes said the walks and errors were costly, including four unearned runs for Brookside in the first inning.

"They only had 10 hits, and a lot of those hits were in the last inning," he said.

Millennium is now 1-5 in the Harvest Christian League and 6-14 overall.

Stevie Ramos tries to find the handle on a softly hit grounder. Glenn Moore/Tracy Press

Tracy opened up the second half of the first inning with eight runs, and starting pitcher Robbie Jackman limited the Titans to two hits and two runs in the first four innings while striking out seven Friday at Monte Vista School.

Jackman also drove in three runs for the Bullpups. Others who got at least two hits and batted in runs included Jake Rivera, Dominik Nazario and Kyle Perez. The win puts the sophomore team at 21-1 for the season and 6-0 in the SJAA.

(F) West 6, Tokay 4

Some good defense saved a close game against one of West’s top league rivals Thursday at West High.

Coach Vince Vargas said that twice in the third inning, Tokay’s batters slammed the ball into deep left field, and twice left fielder Garrett Worthington fired the ball back to shortstop Chris DelDotto, who got the ball to home plate
to tag out runners trying to score.

"We played good defense, and when we started batting, we were really on the ball," Vargas said.

D.J. Watson got two hits, Joey Wagner got two, including a double, and Steven Black and Jeff Rich also got hits.

(F) Tracy 28, Chavez 4

Nick Camper, Tyler Daily and Matt Patterson all slammed home runs while on the road against the Titans on Thursday. Other big hits included triples by Antonio D’Onofrio, Dominic D’Souza, James Fisher, Patterson and Tyler Trew. Daily also batted in five.

All nine of Tracy’s batters scored in the second inning, and the third inning saw the Bullpuppies bring in 13 runs, including Daily’s and Camper’s back-to-back homers.

Tracy is 16-1-1 overall and 6-0 in the SJAA.

Tracy 11, Chavez 8

Kyle Moses knows how to deal with pressure. In the bottom of the seventh inning in Tuesday’s varsity game, the Titans had the bases loaded with no outs and had just scored the tying run on a close play at home.

Moses said he blocked out the thought that a walk or a base hit could hand the Bulldogs their first league loss this year.

"I just tried to focus on my pitches," he said. He struck out the next batter, the next flew out to Brandon Jossey in center field and another ripped a line drive right at third baseman Mattos for the third out.

Until then, the Bulldogs and Titans traded the lead back and forth.

Tracy leadoff batter Ramos sent the first pitch of the game over the center-field fence, just as he had against Franklin the week before.

Chavez’s Matthew Hernandez responded with a bases-loaded home run in the bottom of the first.

In the second inning, Tracy loaded the bases and Ramos cleared them with a double to right-center to tie the score.

Chavez scored again in the third and fourth, and Tracy scored in the fourth and sixth.

Moses’ seventh inning on the mound boosted the Bulldogs’ confidence for the eighth inning, when they launched a base-running attack. Scornaienchi drew a walk, stole second and third, and then raced home when the Chavez catcher’s throw to third base went into left field.

Canale also walked and stole second, dodging the tag when O’Bryan hit a grounder to third and O’Bryan was safe at first. Canale would score on a wild pitch, and O’Bryan followed it up with an exciting burst.

O’Bryan said later that he figured Chavez was rattled when he stepped off third and sprinted to steal home while Kyle Hassna was at bat. The pitch went in the dirt, and O’Bryan was safe.

Daniel Jerome of the Wolf Pack is tagged out at second base during Friday's contest. Glenn Moore/Tracy Press

The Wolf Pack started off Wednesday’s game at McNair with a string of hits both big and small.

West had a 5-0 lead by the end of the first inning and kept scoring in the second, fourth and fifth.

Thomassen got on base through an infield error and came home on a Goulding double. Shepherd drove Goulding home, and Devencenzi hit a double to send Shepherd home. Wentz had a base hit to bring Devencenzi home, and Oetken hit another double to score Wentz.

In the sixth, with a 9-4 lead, West started to rally again. Devencenzi got on base through an infield error, Wentz singled and Oetken was hit by a pitch to load the bases. With one out, Rico Martinez drove a double into left-center to score three.

West also got contributions at the plate from Fontaine, who hit two doubles and drove in two.

(S) Tracy 25, Chavez 2

Ricky Diaz threw 13 strikeouts in five innings and allowed one hit in a win at Chavez.

Coach Perez said the only hit for Chavez was a bunt, as the Titans’ runner beat the throw to first. Six walks and a couple of hit batters allowed Chavez to score three.

Among the Bullpups’ 20 hits were inside-the-park home runs for Jake Rivera and Robert Emerson. Emerson had four RBIs and Rivera had three. Diaz also homered to left field, Mark Rose and Alex Flores both had triples, and Jackman had a double.

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