CCS hangs in balance for Knights

Entering Wednesday home game with Menlo-Atherton, Hillsdale found itself in a three way tie for third place. For the Knights, their 4-1 loss was good news and bad news. Bad news in that they dropped another game. The good news being they didn’t lose much ground in the race for two of the remaining five automatic berths from the Bay Division as the Knights now find themselves in a three-way tie for fourth.

But for Hillsdale manager Wille Baroncini, his focus isn’t on the postseason. It’s on the rematch with the Bears Friday in Atherton.

“Right now, we have to come back and win Friday,” Baroncini said. He said he’s not worried about CCS because there are still so many moving parts.

“(Playoffs) depend on how things go (the rest of the week),” Baroncini said.

As it stands right now, Menlo-Atherton (11-2 PAL Bay, 19-7 overall) has already locked the division’s top seed as the Bay champion. Capuchino was in second entering play Wednesday, with Carlmont moving into solo third place after beating Sequoia, 6-5. King’s Academy, which beat Sacred Heart Prep 7-2, joins both the Ravens and Hillsdale (6-7, 12-12) for a tie for fourth place. Two of those three teams will receive an automatic playoff spot, leaving the third to depend on an at-large berth for a postseason berth.

While M-A didn’t have a lot to play for Wednesday, the Bears certainly want to be firing on all cylinders as they enter the playoffs beginning May 24 and M-A manager Jordan Paroubeck wants his team playing to the best of their abilities these last two games of the regular season.

“Just keep the momentum going,” Paroubeck said.

M-A starting pitcher Wes Peterson certainly helped keep that momentum in the Bears’ dugout. The junior, who has orally committed to Duke University, was nearly unhittable in his outing. He was perfect through 2 1/3 before Hillsdale’s Brady Skidmore took a pitch off his wrist in the bottom of the third inning.

Peterson, who was staked to a 2-0 lead in the top of the first inning, carried a no-hitter into the bottom of the fifth until Bennett Young put down, and beat out, a bunt for one of two hits on the day for the Knights.

Baroncini said he was aware Peterson was pitching a no-hitter, and while many frown on using a bunt to break up a n0-n0, Baroncini said he was just trying to jumpstart his offense.

“Bennett is our best bunter and our fastest guy,” Baronicini said. “We had to get something going.”

Peterson walked the next batter, Curtis Lee, but got a pair of ground balls to end his outing with five scoreless innings.

“He finally found his changeup, but he had three pitches he could throw for strikes,” Paroubeck said.

It certainly helped that he was given a lead before even taking the mound, as the Bears took advantage of a Hillsdale error and a couple of walks to score two runs in the top of the first. With one out, Ryder Kelly hit a high chopper over the third baseman’s head. Jimmy Zaharias followed with a walk to bring up cleanup hitter Will Roberts — who used a sneak-attack bunt on the first pitch that set off a chain of events that led to the first run of the game.

Hillsdale starter Jake Belloni fielded the ball along the first-base line and tried to throw Roberts out at first — only for the ball to sail past the first baseman and into foul territory. That enabled Kelly to score from second and Zaharias taking third.

Paroubeck said he had no problem having his No. 4 hitter bunting. Roberts later added an RBI sacrifice bunt in the fifth.

“He’s a good bunter,”Paroubeck said of Roberts.

When asked if he wants his cleanup hitter bunting, Paroubeck said, “Doesn’t matter. (The goal is) just win.”

Jack Molise, who pairs with Peterson to give the Bears a potent 1-2 punch on the bump, followed Roberts’ bunt by driving in a run on a fielder’s choice.

Belloni, however, settled down after that initial inning. After giving up two hits in the first, he allowed only one other hit, a Roberts’ third-inning single as Belloni went five innings, giving up one earned run on three hits.

“[Belloni] is like a dawg,” Baroncini said. “He battled it out.”

M-A tacked on an another unearned run against Belloni in the top of the fifth. Kelly, again, got the rally started with a walk. Zaharias followed and hit what looked like a tailor-made double play ball right up the middle.

But both the Hillsdale shortstop and second baseman pulled up near the second-base bag without either of them making a play and the ball going into center field for an error, with Kelly hustling to third.

That 90 feet proved pivotal as Roberts followed with his sacrifice bunt to drive in Kelly for a 3-0 Bears’ lead. They made it 4-0 on a Merrick Lee RBI flare single to left to drive in JT Anderson, who had walked and moved to second on a Ronan Cutright walk.

Hillsdale avoided the shutout when Belloni took an M-A reliever deep, hitting a home run to dead center field in the bottom of the sixth. Jaden Minahan nearly accomplished the same in the bottom of the seventh, instead settling for a booming double off the center-field wall.

Bellarmine 1, Serra 0

The Padres had a six-game winning streak snapped as the Bells eliminated Serra in the semifinals of the West Catholic Athletic League tournament.

Bellarmine scored the game’s only run in the top of the sixth, With Nathan Chew doubling home Nate Bateman, who had singled ahead of Chew.

Bells starting pitcher Preston Pera got the win, allowing just three hits as he worked into the fifth inning. Emmett Arnott, a freshman, got the save with 1 1/3 innings of perfect relief.

Davis Minton was the hard-luck loser for Serra, as he allowed one run on just four hits in 5 2/3 innings of work.