SAN JOSE
– The Morgan Hill American Pinto All-Star team won its three
games in the San Jose Pacific PONY Regional tournament and are in
position to win the tournament championship.
SAN JOSE – The Morgan Hill American Pinto All-Star team won its three games in the San Jose Pacific PONY Regional tournament and are in position to win the tournament championship.
Morgan Hill, which is guaranteed a spot in the Sectionals also held at Dartmouth Middle School, will be competing for the championship Friday night at 5:30 p.m. The team will be facing either San Jose Pacific or South San Francisco.
Both are teams Morgan Hill defeated in the tournament. If the American squad loses Friday, it will play Saturday at 10 a.m. for the championship in the double elimination tournament.
MH American 9, SJ Pacific 5
Morgan Hill received a strong effort from everyone on the team in the semifinals of the San Jose Pacific PONY Regional Tournament and again won a 9-5 game. The key to the game again was the strong pitching. Both teams scored five runs in the first inning. The steel-trap defense and stingy pitching shutdown the San Jose team and did not allow a single run after the first inning.
The Morgan Hill pitchers Joe Tuttle, Jackson Gion and Sean Schlaefli combined for 12 strikeouts. MHA came back in the fourth and fifth innings and added two runs. Josiah Wylie, Jayson Smith and Jackson Gion provided the offense for the American team.
Game balls went to Wylie, Gion, Kyle Quadros and Nick Swanson.
MH American 9
MH National B 5
In the match between Morgan Hill rivals, the Americans, as the visitors, came away with the victory.
The National team got off to a quick start, scoring runs in the second and third inning. Although MHA was shutout in the first three innings, the team put together a rally in the top of the fourth inning, scoring seven runs. This surge proved to be enough as the MHA pitching stepped up a notch in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings. The American defense became stingy and turned back an extremely motivated and determined National team.
Jackson Gion and Sean Schlaefli pitched well for the American team. Jayson Smith led the Americans offensively. . Game balls went to the closing pitcher’s and the offensive player of the game.
MH American 6
South San Fran. 1
Pitching guided Morgan Hill to a win over a scrappy South San Francisco team in the first game of the tournament. San Francisco scored first in the top of the second inning, but that was all the Morgan Hill defense would give up.
The Morgan Hill pitchers Josiah Wylie, Kyle Quadros, Tommy Naranjo,and Joe Tuttle combined for 15 strikeouts and five scoreless innings.
Over the course of three games, Morgan Hill stuck out 44 of the 85 batters, allowed 22 walks.
