Their backs are to the wall, but the Morgan Hill Gold All-Stars
still have plenty of confidence
MORGAN HILL — Their backs are to the wall, but the Morgan Hill Gold All-Stars still have plenty of confidence after their 7-4 loss to Los Altos/Mountain View’s ‘A’ team in the first round of the Morgan Hill Section Bronco 12 Tournament.
That they surrendered three unearned runs Tuesday at Britton Middle School leaves little to the imagination.
“They’re doing a fabulous job,” Gold manager John Bennett said of his players. “They played very well. We had a couple miscues that cost it for us. We felt like we could have won that game.”
The Gold All-Stars will continue play in the six-team double-elimination tournament at 9:30 p.m. Saturday.
Despite their ‘B’ status, Bennett’s bunch was not intimidated Tuesday; they’ve made a hobby of beating ‘A’ teams. The close-knit Gold All-Stars upset several of those in recent tournaments.
“This ‘B’ team is a very good ‘A’-quality type of team,” Bennett said. “Most of our players have been together for at least two years.
“Our confidence level goes back.”
Morgan Hill’s off-speed specialist Justin Dziuba made a steady start, striking out four in three-plus innings. The lefty yielded one earned run.
“They’re an ‘A’ team, so we figured they’d seen a lot of heat in the past couple games,” Bennett said. “We threw Justin at them, and it worked out really well.”
With the scored tied 3-3, Gold’s Jesse Osuna took over midway through the fourth and went the rest of the way.
Brandon Sorce scored Morgan Hill’s last run in the final inning after he drew a walk, stole second and advanced to third on Zach Riveron’s bunt.
Riveron collected two walks and a hit, and Clay Miller, Asa Jacob and Osuna drove in runs for Gold.
