As Burlingame pinch runner Keunho Kim comes in to score, he encourages courtesy runner Josh Higashi to follow. Both scored during the Panthers’ four-run eighth.
Having embraced their small-ball style, the Burlingame baseball team is never out of a game.
Having the ability to scratch out a run when needed can boost any team’s confidence, so when the Panthers came to the bat in the top of the seventh inning, trailing host Carlmont 2-1, there was no panic. Burlingame took advantage of a Scots error to score the game-tying run in the top of the seventh and then used an eighth-inning mistake to score four more times on its way to a 6-4 win over the Scots.
“If you execute … I feel confident (scoring a run when we need it),” said Burlingame manager Shawn Scott. “We teach them to play the game the way it’s supposed to play.”
That means getting on base, getting around the bases and then coming up with the clutch hit when in position to do so.
Actually — rewind that. A clutch hit isn’t always necessary to drive in a run. Sometimes it’s a matter of putting the ball in play.
Which is exactly what sophomore shortstop Jake Cilia did in the top of the second when his groundout to second drove in Emilio Flores with the Panthers’ first run of the game.
Cilia then came through with a two-run double in the top of the eighth to plate a couple of insurance runs after catcher Alex McMaster drove in the go-ahead run in the previous at-bat.
“It’s just situational hitting,” Cilia said. “Just get them (the base runners) in. I think everyone understands what they need to do to help the team win.”
It was a tough loss for Carlmont to absorb. The Scots entered play Wednesday tied with Menlo School for second place in the Peninsula Athletic League Bay Division standings, two games behind the division leading Panthers.
Burlingame (8-1 PAL Bay, 10-4 overall) now has a three game lead over the division after beating Carlmont (5-4, 10-10) and Menlo falling to Capuchino.
“[Burlingame] played the game — get ’em on, get ’em over, get ’em in,” said Carlmont manager Rich Vallero. “We were two outs away from beating a team that has only one loss in league. It was a tough pill to swallow.”
Burlingame’s late rally made a loser of Carlmont starting pitcher David Bedrosian, who worked into the eighth inning. But Carlmont’s normally solid defense let the team down when the Scots needed it the most. Bedrosian got a flyout on his first pitch of the seventh inning, with Carlmont leading 2-1. The next batter, Thomas McClure, came up and hit a routine grounder to third, but the third baseman booted it, putting a runner on first and giving the Panthers hope.
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And they took advantage of the gift. After McClure stole second and moved to third on a Gino Lopiccolo single to left, leadoff hitter Preston Lau drove him home with the tying run on a single to right. A strikeout and a groundout ended the inning, but the Panthers extended the game.
Another Carlmont error in the eighth opened the door for the Panthers to win the game. Cleanup hitter Taylor Clark hit a routine grounder to the shortstop, who misplayed it. He recovered and fired to first to make the play close, but the field umpire ruled Clark had beat the throw. Flores followed and hit a single to left, with Clark going to third.
He would score on a McMaster high chopper that the Carlmont pitcher got the fingertip of his glove on, but it slowed the ball down enough to allow McMaster to leg out the infield hit, with Clark scoring the go-ahead run on the play.
That brought up Cilia, who flared an opposite double that dropped right in front of the charging rightfielder for two more runs and a 5-2 Burlingame lead. Lopiccolo rounded out the scoring for the Panthers with a sacrifice fly to center.
Carlmont got two of the runs back in the bottom of the inning. The Scots loaded the bases with no outs, with Adam Cross and Bedrosian driving in runs with groundouts.
But Burlingame reliever Tyler Moniz-Witten got the final out on a popup to notch the win with three innings of relief of Burlingame starter Noah Larkin.
Burlingame took a 1-0 lead in the top of the second on a Cilia groundout, but Carlmont tied the game with a run in the bottom of the third on a Jack Banoncini double to drive in Jake Robinson, who had singled.
Carlmont’s Jake Robinson is fired up after scoring in the bottom of the fifth inning to give the Scots’ a 2-1 lead.
Nathan Mollat/Daily Journal
Robinson went 3 for 3 with two runs score for the Scots.
Carlmont took a 2-1 lead with a run in the bottom of the fifth. Again, it was Robinson who jump-started the rally with a single and then advanced on a pair of wild pitches, scoring on a Mateos Melkesian single to center through a drawn-in infield.
But it was the Panthers who rallied for the win late.
“I feel our team is a fighting team,” Cilia said. “We’ll ground out runs when we need them.”
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