Blue Powers into Pony Finals

Pali Blue blazed through the regular season and playoffs like a runaway freight train. It seemed nothing could stop Head Coach David Kahn’s team from winning the championship’ except a scheduling conflict. Blue players showed up at the Field of Dreams complex on Tuesday and began warming up as usual. The only problem was that their opponents, the Metro Toros, never showed up, apparently thinking the game was on a different day. At press time, no make-up date had been determined. Pali Blue (18-4) reached the finals by routing the Mira Costa Dodgers 16-3 last Saturday and beating Pali White 5-1 on Sunday. Preston Clifford and Julian Hart both legged out triples against Mira Costa in a game that was called after five innings because of the 10-run mercy rule. Hudson Ling went 3-for-3 with a home run, Brett Elder also went 3-for-3, Alex Kahn went 2-for-4 and Hart and George Mitchel each went 2-for-3. Anthony Poulos, Nicky Baron and Elder took care of the pitching. Ling then pitched four scoreless innings against Coach Robert Flutie’s gritty Pali White squad. Brett Elder came in to close out the game, a combined four-hitter. Kahn had two walks and scored two runs for Blue, while Tyler McMorrow was the star at the plate, with a hit off the center field wall in the third inning and a two-run home run in the fifth. Pali White (13-8) had edged the Cheviot Storm 4-3 in the first round of the playoffs and the Cheviot Hills Sea Dogs 8-7 in the quarterfinals. Flutie started a game-ending double play at catcher when he tagged out a runner trying to score on a failed squeeze bunt, then threw a strike to third base, where Tyler Newman tagged out another Cheviot Hills runner advancing from second. Rounding out the Blue squad were Clay Davis, Joseph Fasano, Truman Hanks and Connor Page. Pali White’s roster consisted of Flutie, Newman, Alec Dodson, Aidan Fite, Jacob Goodman, Tyler Goodman, Jackson Kogan, Brandon Kupfer, Kevin McNamee, Reece Pascoe, Dawson Rosenberg, Matthew Stockman and Joey Velez. Meanwhile, Coach Rick McGeagh’s Pali Red (13-7) had finished third in the regular season and advanced to the semifinals by beating the Cheviot Claws. Led by Wylie Beatley, Wiley Gibbens, Louie Greenwald, Cade Hulse, Dylan Joyce, Kevin Lombardo, Matt and Jack McGeagh, Nick Rivera, Joe Rosenbaum, Jasper Shorr, Jonathan Sington and Michael Vastano, Red fell to the second-seeded Metro Toros one game short of the finals.