Baseball
Valley Christian tightens WCAL baseball standings
A week ago, St. Francis had quite a bit of breathing room in the race for the West Catholic Athletic League regular-season baseball championship.
Now, not so much.
Valley Christian’s 7-5 victory at home over St. Francis on Saturday set the stage for a dramatic final week of the league schedule.
When Valley visits Bellarmine on Tuesday, it’ll amount to an elimination game for both teams. They are tied for second in the standings with 9-2-1 records. St. Francis (10-2) remains first.
If St. Francis loses at St. Ignatius on Tuesday or at home against Archbishop Mitty in its regular-season finale Thursday, the Bellarmine-Valley winner would just have to win its final league game to capture the title.
Friday, Bellarmine visits Sacred Heart Cathedral and Valley plays host to Serra.
St. Francis, ranked second by the Bay Area News Group, lost two games in the standings to both of its nearest pursuers last week. No. 7 Bellarmine beat St. Francis on Tuesday, opening the door for third-ranked Valley to tighten the race even more Saturday.
Valley’s victory over St. Francis came one day after the Warriors scored three runs in the bottom of the seventh to beat SHC 4-3.
The momentum carried over as Valley scored one in the third, four in the fourth and two in the fifth to take a 7-1 lead against the WCAL leader.
St. Francis scored four in the seventh before Valley got the final out.
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Tatum Marsh had two hits, including a homer, and Easton Kreshel had two hits and knocked in two runs to lead Valley, which improved to 20-4-1.
Wyatt King had a home run for St. Francis (21-4).
Granite Bay 10, No. 1 De La Salle 5
De La Salle gave up seven runs in the first two innings on its way to a loss at home to Granite Bay in a non-league game.
Alec Nava had three hits and two RBIs for De La Salle (18-4).
Granite Bay is 11-13.
No. 7 Bellarmine 3, No. 8 Archbishop Mitty 1
Chase Knight went 2 for 3 with two RBIs and Kyler Bacosa pitched a complete game with seven strikeouts to lead Bellarmine to a victory on the road over Mitty in WCAL play.
Bellarmine improved to 18-5-1, 9-2-1.
Jarren Advincula had two hits and an RBI for Mitty (16-7, 5-7).
No. 12 Sacred Heart Cathedral 5, St. Ignatius 4 (9 innings)
Sacred Heart Cathedral scored a run in the bottom of the seventh to tie the score against St. Ignatius and then won the WCAL game in the ninth.
Ivan Herrera had two hits, including a homer, and scored three runs and Justin Tapia and Lucas Kelly also homered for SHC (14-9-1, 6-6).
Malcom Felix and Lenny Beatie each had two hits for SI (10-12, 3-9).
