On Friday, the Varsity Dons Baseball team traveled to Pleasanton to take on the 6-1 Foothill Falcons (ranked #4 in NCS D1).
Foothill ran up the score early on timely hitting, and a few defensive miscues, spoiling another good start by Dante Montgomery (Sr). The Falcons pitcher who has been shutting down teams all season kept the Dons in check for 5 innings, yielding only 2 hits while striking out 9. Down 10-1 after 5 innings, the Dons didn’t give up, however. In the 6th, with one out, Bergman walked and Berrien (Sr) hit a long triple to left-center easily scoring Bergman.
Connor McPhail (Sr) singled in Berrien, Sammy Lee (Jr) was hit by a pitch, Montgomery (Sr) reached on an error, Logan Ketchum (Sr) singled up the middle scoring McPhail, Andrew Habas (Jr) walked to score Lee. Four runs in and it was looking much more promising at 10-4 and the Dons had chewed through the first Foothill reliever.
In the top of the 7th, the furious Dons rally continued adding 4 more runs before ultimately falling short. Not before the Dons chewed through Foothill’s best reliever. Bergman stayed hot at the plate with a leadoff triple.
McPhail was HBP (yes, again), Toby Schwing (Jr) singled to center scoring Bergman, and then… Sammy Lee homered on a deep fly to left getting the Dons within reach at 11-8
Ketchum was HBP but ultimately the Falcons defense held, and the Dons rally fell just short
Over the final 2 1/3 innings, Henry Souza (So) and Tyson Bates (Jr) held the Falcons to only 1 run as the Dons defense tightened considerably.
Next Up for the Dons: Another tough challenge as the Dons face #1 ranked College Park home and away on Tuesday and Thursday.