Oslund, West Torrance too much for Valencia
|
Baseball playoffs: The Tigers surrender two early home runs, go on to lose, 8-1.
If Marc Oslund is going to play like he did Tuesday, the West Torrance coaching staff might want to send him to the mound for the rest of the playoffs.
Oslund put on a one-man wrecking crew performance against Valencia Tigers in the second round of the CIF-SS Division II playoffs, leading the Warrior to an 8-1 victory and setting up a quarterfinal matchup against El Toro.
Oslund threw a complete game in which he scattered five hits, allowed one unearned run, went 3 for 4 at the plate, drove in four runs and blasted a tape-measure home run over the center-field wall.
All in a day's work.
"I was just trying to get that first-pitch strike and get the first guy out each inning," Oslund said. "Mason [Morioka]called a great game, and even when I threw pitches that they hit hard, my teammates were making great plays behind me.
"We showed up today, offense, defense, everything."
The Warriors (27-3) jumped all over Valencia starter Carl Robinson, scoring their eight runs in the first four innings.
After Robinson sandwiched two strikeouts around a harmless ground out in the first inning, the first five West Torrance batters reached base in the top half of the second, with the big blast coming from Brian Cote's three-run home run.
Oslund followed suit in the third with his rocket to center for two more runs, and the Warriors capped their scoring with three more in the fourth, the final two coming on Oslund's line-drive double to left.
The victory was West Torrance's 15th in a row and ended the season for Valencia (21-8), which finished second in the Empire League.
Valencia coach Mike Scheetz knew his team was in trouble when the runs started to pile up.
"We figured if we were going to win this game, it was going to have to be 3-2 or 2-1, a low scoring game," Scheetz said. "We weren't going to slug it out with them, we knew that. But they made the plays on offense and in the field and did what they had to do to win."
Contact the writer: preps@ocvarsity.com
We want our site to be a place where people discuss and debate ideas that foster stronger communities. We built this for you. Please take care of it. Tolerate broad thinking, but take action against obscene or hateful material. Make it a credible and safe place worth preserving and sharing.
