A look at Orange County baseball:
• This final week of the regular season could bring some wild finishes. In the South Coast League, if Tesoro wins its two games against Capistrano Valley, and Mission Viejo and Trabuco Hills split their two games, there would be a four-way for first place.
• Nobody wants to play three games this week, especially in this heat. But if teams need to play a third game to break up any ties or settle playoff berths, they would play Friday. No games are scheduled for Friday as this date, the final day regular-season games can be played, is left open for any tiebreaker games that would need to be scheduled.
• However, if there is no way such added games could settle the situation, then coin flips would be the way to do it.
• This week’s schedule is loaded with playoff-implication games. Here are a few of them: Tuesday, Rancho Alamitos at Garden Grove; Edison at Fountain Valley; Savanna vs. Katella at Boysen Park; Orange Lutheran at Servite; Aliso Niguel at San Clemente; Mission Viejo at Trabuco Hills; Mater Dei at JSerra, 6 p.m.
• Those matchups are the same for Thursday, with today’s home team the visitor Thursday.
• Fountain Valley pitcher Scott Schultz was the pitcher of record in the Barons’ two wins over Marina last week. He is 12-0.
• Tesoro pitcher Blake Anderson set the school single-game strikeout record with 11 in a win over El Toro last week.
• Aliso Niguel third baseman Domenic Colacchio last week was 6 for 9 with a home run, six RBI and four runs scored. He is hitting .500 in Sea View League play.
• Mater Dei freshman Nick Pratto pitched a two-hit shutout with nine strikes and hit two doubles in a win over Servite last week.
• Adam Lamar pitched a two-hitter for Beckman in a win over Woodbridge
• Brandon Alamo of Cypress last week hit a winning home run and drove in three runs. Pitcher Josh Gogue got a win and a save.
• Baseball teams are allowed to play a maximum of 20 regular-season games. Look at teams’ records in the rankings and you will see that they all have surpassed 20 games played. They still are under the official number of 20, because doubleheaders count as only one game and a tournament, no matter how many games played in it, count as only two games.
• CIF-Southern Section baseball playoff brackets will be released Monday. Brackets for divisions 2, 4 and 6 are released at 8:30 a.m. followed by brackets for divisions 1, 3, 5 and 7 at 9 a.m. All of the pairings, and which teams qualified for the playoffs as at-large teams, will be at ocvarsity.com upon release.
• The playoffs begin with wild-card round games May 20 in divisions 2,4 and 6. Wild-card round games are May 21 in divisions 1, 3, 5 and 7.
• First-round games are May 22 in divisions 2, 4 and 6. First-round games are May 23 in divisions 1, 3, 5 and 7. The remaining playoff schedule: second round, May 27; quarterfinals, May 30; semifinals, June 3; finals, June 6 (divisions 1, 2 and 3 at Dodger Stadium) and June 7 (divisions 4, 5, 6 and 7 at UC Riverside).
• Teams automatically qualify for the playoffs if they are among the top two finishers in four-team leagues, if they are among the top three finishers in five- and six-team leagues and if they are among the top four finishers in seven- and eight-team leagues.
• A teams that did not finish high enough in its leagues’ final standings for automatic playoff berths can apply for at-large berth consideration if the team has an overall record of .500 or better.
• Six county teams recevied at-large berths last season.
• JSerra is No. 3 in the Register’s county media poll, but is No. 1 in Division 1 in the CIF-Southern Section’s coaches poll. County No. 1 Fountain Valley is No. 3 in Division 1, immediately behind Loyola of Los Angeles, and county No. 2 Huntington Beach is No. 4 in Division 1.
• Dana Hills, No. 1 in Division 2 last week, is No. 2 this week behind Great Oak of Temecula which beat last week’s No. 2 Temecula Valley twice last week. Sonora is No. 2 in Division 4, behind Kaiser of Fontana. Crea Lutheran is No. 1 in Division 6.
• Looking at the county top 10, then ranking teams 11-25 for a county top 25: 11. Capistrano Valley (16-12-1); 12. Foothill (17-10); 13. Trabuco Hills (19-9); 14. Orange Lutheran (13-11); 15. Mission Viejo (17-10); 16. Sonora (18-6-1); 17. Canyon (15-9); 18. Pacifica (19-9); 19. Esperanza (17-7); 20. Mater Dei (12-12); 21. Servite (12-17); 22. Tesoro (18-10); 23. Valencia (21-6); 24. Laguna Beach (22-2); 25. El Dorado (13-11).
Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com
