Senior Michael Strem has had a lot of good days in his baseball career. But it wasn't until Wednesday that he could truly say he'd had a perfect day.
Strem retired all 21 batters he faced Wednesday afternoon as top-seeded St. Francis advanced to the quarterfinals of the Central Coast Section Division I playoffs with a 2-0 victory over visiting Monta Vista. With the victory, the Lancers (26-4) move on to face West Catholic Athletic League rival Valley Christian (18-11), a 10-0 winner over Wilcox.
"It's a pretty amazing, special day that I'll remember for the rest of my life," Strem said.
Strem may not have had to be perfect, but he had to pretty awfully good to keep his team in the game, as Monta Vista starter Peter Stern matched the Lancer ace zero for zero until the bottom of the sixth inning, when St. Francis finally broke through.
To add to his perfect day, Strem even played a role in the game-winning rally, drawing a walk to put runners on first in second after senior Kort Peterson hit a bases-empty, two-out double. After another walk, senior Mark Cardinalli lined a single to right field to drive in two runs and give the Lancers a 2-0 lead.
"It definitely helped that the game was close because I couldn't lose focus at all," Strem said. "And this being a CCS game, we knew that tomorrow wasn't guaranteed so we had to step up as a team. The important thing was to get the win."
The Boston College-bound righthander took it from there, using his four-pitch arsenal of fastballs, changeups, curves and sliders to finish with eight strikeouts and his first-ever no-hitter, including Little League.
"I had all four pitches working today," he said. "I was getting ahead early so I was able to keep my pitch count down."
Stern held the powerful Lancer offense to just three hits himself, but Strem was just a little better on this day. In fact, he was perfect.
