BASEBALL: Eagles Soar into CCS Finals

As a Los Altos No. 36 jersey hung just outside the Los Altos High baseball team’s dugout as a reminder of great accomplishments of the past, the members of the 2011 edition made some new cherished memories of their own Thursday night in the 2011 Central Coast Section Division II semifinals at San Jose Municipal Stadium in San Jose.

After a combined 17 runs and 25 hits worth of offense, Los Altos senior pitcher Mat Snider Jr. watched a softly hit liner go past the mound and safely into the glove of second baseman Joseph Chedid, ending a wild game between No. 4 seed Los Altos and top seeded Pioneer High-San Jose.

Los Altos won the game 9-8 to advance to Saturday’s CCS D-II championship game against Monterey High.

“Well I certainly know now how those guys (Pioneer High) won 23 games,” Los Altos head coach Sandy Wihtol said. “Those guys can swing the bat. They didn’t chase pitches out of the zone and really can hit the fastball.”

Los Altos pulled off a pair of one-run wins over Burlingame High and Los Gatos in rounds one and two to advance to the semis in the D-II draw.

Before the run began, ex-Eagles player Scotty Russell called his former head coach and told him that he’d like to speak to the team. Russell, a member of the Los Altos team that won CCS in 2007 with a come from behind 6-5 win over Aptos High and also was a part of the team that lost 3-1 to Wilcox in the D-II finals in 2008, told the 2011 players to take the jersey and bring it back to where it belongs—the CCS Championship Game.

“That’s what makes coaching high school baseball so much fun,” Wihtol said. “He went through both things--winning and losing it. It was a good thing for our guys to hear.”

Each player touched the jersey for luck before each game of the playoffs. In the seventh inning, the luck and maybe the wind, was on the Eagles side.

Los Altos led wire-to-wire in the semifinal thriller, but it certainly wasn’t easy.

Ahead 9-5 going into the final frame, the relentless Pioneer lineup drew a walk, singled and stroked an RBI double to the gap to open the inning.

A groundout scored one more Mustangs player, then after a swinging strikeout off a nasty Snider Jr. curve ball, an RBI single to right field trimmed the Eagles advantage down to only one run.

With two on and two away, a Snider pitch was ejected down the left field line just dotting the grass left of the foul line. The near miss would have tied the game and possibly given the Mustangs the dramatic walk-off win if the ball landed fair.

“My heart skipped a beat for a second,” Snider Jr. said. “But I got a good look at it. There was all kinds of craziness going on, but I knew it went foul.”

Instead of a ringing single down the line, Pioneer ended the game with a light line out to second, stranding it’s 11th and 12th runners of the game in the final inning of play.

“I was just praying Joe(Chedid) was in the right position,” Snider Jr. said.  “I’m glad he was.”

Los Altos scored runs in the first three innings of play led by scrappy shortstop Steven McLean.

The Eagles sophomore had four hits on the day, including a lead-off single in the first and a RBI single off the starting pitchers glove in the second that made the score 3-0 Los Altos.

“Mentally, we were ready to go,” McLean said. “But we’re not done yet. We’ve still got more work to do.”

No. 9 hitter Dominic Gachina had two hits in his first two at-bats--the second put Los Altos ahead 6-2 in the top of the third.

Each side traded runs in the middle innings, but Los Altos always kept at least a two-run edge during the sparring.

A Mitch Kehlet RBI single to center field made the score 9-5 Los Altos after five and half innings of playoff baseball.

Kehlet and Snider Jr. both could start on the mound in Saturday’s championship game, but no starting pitcher has been decided on. Junior Luke Wiechec started and pitched four taxing innings on Thursday night.

“My arm will be ready,” Snider Jr. said. “My arm heals fast and it’s a championship game. I’ll be jacked up with so much adrenaline anyways.”

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Los Altos 9, Pioneer 8

L- 2 1 3 0 2 1 0- 9 10 0

P-0 2 1 1 1 0 3 – 8 15 3

WP: Wiechec. LP: Oxner