Soaring Branham seizes baseball title
With a first-year coach calling the shots and a sophomore pitcher on the mound, Branham continued its remarkable turnaround season, beating Oak Grove 5-2 to win the Santa Teresa Division title.
The Bruins moved down from the Blossom Valley Athletic League’s Mount Hamilton Division after going 4-20 last season, which made Friday’s victory even more satisfying.
Branham (22-4, 18-3) got an outstanding performance from sophomore Chris Mendoza, whose lively fastball and nasty curve kept the host Eagles off-balance.
Mendoza (10-2) struck out 10 and scattered eight hits.
“I felt comfortable with both my pitches today, and my catcher Daniel Scholl knew what to call at the right time,” Mendoza said.
The senior captain Scholl (3 for 4, two runs) made the most of a second chance in the first inning when Oak Grove first baseman Mark Francis misplayed a foul pop-up. Scholl drilled a single up the middle, and one out later junior cleanup hitter Gino Valletta drove a ball the opposite way over the right-field fence for his first varsity home run.
“That was a huge emotional boost,” said Branham Coach Landon Jacobs, who coached the frosh-soph team for two years before taking over the varsity this season. “And for Mendoza to show that kind of poise as a sophomore - that was impressive.”
The Bruins scored again in the second after two hits plus a pair of errors by Oak Grove third baseman Tyler Bento.
The Eagles (18-6, 16-5) were playing with heavy hearts after the death this week of Bobby Draminski, the team’s No.1 starter and cleanup hitter last season. Draminski, who was playing for the Oregon Institute of Technology, was killed in a head-on collision in Klamath Falls, Ore., on Monday.
Eagles starter Nick Loredo and shortstop Greg Fujii were close to Draminski, who practiced with the team for three weeks before moving to Oregon.
“He was the toughest kid I ever coached - we rode his back for the last two years,” Oak Grove Coach Tom Galante said.
Galante said the normally boisterous team was subdued all week. The Eagles lost in extra innings to Evergreen Valley on Wednesday to drop out of a tie for first.
“We were all shocked, but we tried to use it as something to play for - to win it for Bobby,” said Loredo (10-2). “But we just didn’t step up when we needed to.”
Bento doubled and scored on a single by David Kocina in the fifth, and Loredo (2 for 4) singled and was driven in by Anthony Dean in the sixth. But Branham scored a run in the sixth, and another in the seventh when Scholl doubled deep to left center and scored on a single by Valletta.
Both teams qualified for the CCS playoffs, which start next week.