WATSONVILLE, CA — The St. Francis Central Coast Catholic High baseball team has shown a knack for knocking off highly regarded Bishop schools.
Fifth-seeded St. Francis CCC, which was making its Central Coast Section Open Division debut, took down a heavy hitter by defeating No. 12 seed Archbishop Mitty 3-1 Wednesday afternoon in Watsonville.
Sophomore first baseman Ruben Ibarra hit a two-run double and starting pitcher Danny Cervantes threw a complete-game, four-hitter while striking out seven, hitting three and walking two to pick up the win.
“I had a lot of butterflies at the beginning of the game,” said Cervantes. “It was so loud.”
Once Cervantes’ nerves settled, so did the Sharks, who were able to beat Stanford-bound Mitty ace Kris Bubic.
Bubic threw six innings, striking out eight and gave three runs (two earned) in the game.
Wednesday’s win marked the second time this year St. Francis was able beat a higher ranked Bishop School and the first one was a real doozy.
Back in April, the Sharks beat the then-No. 2 ranked team in the country Bishop Gorman-Las Vegas, 9-4.
Bishop Gorman wrapped up the season this past weekend securing its eighth Nevada state title since 2006.
In that game, St. Francis CCC defeated UNLV-bound right-hander Chase Maddux, the son of Hall of Fame pitcher Greg Maddux. With these two wins, the Sharks feel they can beat anybody.
“We came out with fire and intensity,” Ibarra said. “It was the same we had with Gorman. When we come out and hit, it’s hard to stop us.”
Mitty (20-11), a fourth-place finisher in the West Catholic Athletic League, was not able to get a runner past second base after the fifth inning.
St. Francis CCC (23-5), tri-champions of the Santa Cruz Coast Athletic League knew it wasn’t going to get many chances to get to Bubic so when the Sharks had the opportunity, they made the most of them.
In the third inning, after Mitty centerfielder Haydn King committed an error letting No. 9 hitter Peter Balestri to advance to second, Sahid Valenzuela drove a 3-2 pitch to center field scoring Balestri.
Following a walk to Braxton Peterson, Ibarra launhed a two-run double to right-center on the first pitch to give the Sharks a 3-0 lead.
From there Cervantes did the rest.
“Incredible,” said St. Francis CCC coach Kenny Nakagawa. “He’s been bugging me since we got into the Open that he wanted to throw the first game and we have a lot of confidence in Danny. He said point blank ‘give me the ball and we’ll win’ and he did his job.”
With the win the Sharks will now face No. 4-seeded Carlmont - which beat No. 13 seed Palo Alto 4-0 - on Saturday at 2 p.m. at Hartnell College in Salinas.
Six of the eight WCAL teams qualified for the CCS playoffs, including five in the Open Division, but after Wednesday's first round, only St. Francis, a 5-0 winner over Leigh, managed to advance to the quarterfinals. Max Werner singled and scored the lone Monarchs run on a Valenzuela throwing error.
Brooks Allen was the only player in the game to get multiple hits as the senior went 2-for-3 with a double for Mitty.
Veteran Mitty coach Bill Hutton, who announced during the year that this season — his 33rd as coach of the Monarchs — would be his last, wasn’t able to get the fairytale ending his team was looking for.
Hutton, who compiled a 647-342-5 record with four CCS titles, is going out on his terms and nobody else’s.
“It was a sunny day in Watsonville and long bus ride home. I’m just like the kids, I dreamed of kissing home plate at Muni and doffing my cap to the crowd,” said Hutton. “But it’s time. I’m going to Disneyland this weekend with my family. It’s hard because I love doing this, and it’s not hard because it’s time. I’m going out on my own terms. Plus the odds said it was probably going to end sad anyway. I really wanted to win the first game though. Then you can build some momentum.”
