SARATOGA — El Camino pitcher Michael McCauley stands just 5-9 with his spikes on. When he stepped onto the mound in the Central Coast Section Division VI baseball semifinals Wednesday at West Valley College, though, he looked like he was 6 feet tall. Maybe 7.
McCauley was masterful in fronting the No. 7-seed Colts’ 5-0 victory over No. 3 Leland-San Jose. The senior right-hander fired a three-pitch shutout, with just one of those hits getting out of the infield on a seventh-inning double by Cole Canter. Pitching to contact all afternoon, McCauley struck out three, but induced 10 ground balls.
“Coming into this game, I knew my plan was to get them to roll over the ball, get my ground balls,” McCauley said. “I trust my defense. I’ve done that all season. And that’s what worked for me. Three Ks a game is more than enough. Just trust my defense. Those are my guys. I know they’ll get the outs.”
With the win, El Camino (23-5) punches its ticket to the CCS Division VI finals. The Colts will take on No. 4 Pacific Grove at Excite Ballpark Saturday at 4 p.m.
It marks El Camino’s first appearance in the CCS championship round in 32 years, since the Colts fell 3-0 to Serra in the Division I finals. El Camino is 2-1 all-time in CCS championship games, including section titles in 1975 and ’77 under former manager Lou Zuardo.
The Colts were on a mission this season after finishing in the Peninsula Athletic League Ocean Division cellar last season and being demoted to the “C” league PAL Lake Division for the first time since 2017. El Camino responded by running the table in the Lake Division this season with a perfect 15-0 league record, and in non-league play posting a 4-2 record against PAL Ocean Division opponents.
“To be honest with you, I don’t want to sound cocky, this was our goal,” Colts manager Dan Ordonez said. “We knew when we moved down we had some eyes to open. We were voted out of the Ocean last year, and kind of felt that was a slight disrespect. So, we wanted to make sure that teams will remember us this year. This was our goal from the start of the year, to make it to [the CCS championship] game.”
McCauley has been on quite a roll the last few weeks, going 3-0 in his last four starts. With Wednesday’s victory, he improves to 5-0 on the year with a 2.28 ERA.
The right-handed dart thrower was in command from the outset and — by virtue of his RBI double in the top of the first capping a two-run rally — he never allowed the tying run to get to the plate. He set down the first seven batters he faced. After the Colts scratched out an unearned run in the top of the third with a sacrifice fly from sophomore Gabe Meriales, McCauley allowed his first base runner of the day on an infield single.
“Today we were looking fastball first pitch,” Leland manager Jeff Canter said, “and then after the first two innings it was ‘take,’ and he was filling it up with strike one anyway. Even after we started taking, it was behind in the count. So, he was hitting his spots.”
Leland (20-8) broke up the no-hitter on a nothing hit, as Sebastian Camacho hit a harmless comebacker McCauley. The soft one-hopper took McCauley to the first-base side of the mound, and he started jogging toward first base, looking to give an underhand toss to first baseman Hunter Tamayo. Only, Tamayo thought McCauley was going to run the ball all the way to the bag, and stepped off the base, at which point McCauley tried to out-leg Camacho, but was a half step late.
“It was a bit of a miscommunication,” McCauley said. “He thought I was going to go to the bag, and I saw him coming off. But it’s OK. Honestly, less pressure on the defense.”
Recommended for you
McCauley went on to retire 10 of the next 11 batters he faced. The only other Leland batter to reach through the first six frames — Billy Hendricks with a leadoff infield singe in the fifth — was erased as McCauley bounced back to induce a tailor-made double-play grounder to senior shortstop Nicholas Jang.
“He’s as smooth as a hot knife through butter,” Ordonez said of Jang’s defense. “He’s a four-year starter for us. Whenever there’s a ball hit to him, I can more or less just turn my back, get ready to go for the next play. He’s our anchor in the infield, for sure.”
Jang totaled six infield assists on the day.
“We were hitting a lot of ground balls at, apparently, the player of the year at shortstop,” Jeff Canter said. “He made every single play.”
Leland starting pitcher Zach Sutton worked just 1 1/2 innings before giving way to Samuel Mao, the Santa Teresa League Pitcher of the Year who was pitching on three day’s rest after working 6 2/3 innings to earn the win in Saturday’s 7-6 win over North Monterey County in the CCS opener.
“We didn’t want to run him back out there, but we had to,” Jeff Canter said.
El Camino added insurance runs with Jang scoring on an infield error in the fourth, and Tamayo knocking in Jang with an RBI double in the sixth.
The Colts had reliever Adrian Iniguez — who turned in the defensive highlight of the day in center field by running down a deep fly ball with an all-out sprinting catch in the second — warmed up heading into the seventh but, even after Cole Canter’s leadoff double, and a one-out walk to Jayden Visperas, McCauley was poised to finish out his gem.
“I figured with Mikey being at the pitch count that he was at, and his mental toughness, there was no way that I was going to pull him,” Ordonez said. “This was going to be his game to finish.”
McCauley bounced back by inducing an infield popup for the second out of the seventh, and finishing off the game with backbreaker curveball for a called third strike. He totaled 74 pitches on the day, 54 for strikes.
“It feels great,” McCauley said of heading to the CCS finals. “These are my brothers. We’ve been playing together since little league. ... It feels great. It’s finally all clicking together. We deserve this win after a long time.”
(0) comments
Welcome to the discussion.
Log In
Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who make comments.
Keep it clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
Don't threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Anyone violating these rules will be issued a warning. After the warning, comment privileges can be revoked.