Pitching is staple of PAL’s three San Mateo baseball teams

All three of San Mateo’s Peninsula Athletic League teams have flexed their arms through non-league play. But with the PAL’s league schedule getting into full swing this week, will those arms hold up? And, perhaps more importantly, will their respective defenses help them out?

“We’re 6-1 and we’ve had five well-pitched games,” Aragon manager Lenny Souza said. “We think we have good pitching, and if we play (defense) behind it we’re going to be in all these games.”

The Dons have indeed been dominant on the mound. Fronted by power-arm Pat Mori and finesse arm Ashton Moniz-Witten, Aragon has posted a team ERA of 2.80. Hillsdale has been even more effective, posting a 2.13 ERA as a team. San Mateo has been the best with a stellar 1.06 team ERA, allowing just 17 total runs through eight games.

Souza and first-year Hillsdale manager Ed Serrata both expressed concerns about their defensive lapses, however.

The Knights have committed 17 errors through 10 games, for a respectable .938 fielding percentage. Still, the timing of those errors has been costly, especially in a March 8 non-league matchup with San Mateo’s other team, the Serra Padres, in which a third-inning Hillsdale error opened the door for a two-run Serra rally. The Padres went on to a 3-0 win.

“What we absolutely did not expect (this season) is to kick the ball around so much,” Serrata said.

Hillsdale’s emerging pitching depth

Hillsdale’s starting rotation is fronted by senior Chris Kelly and junior Nick Strezo. Kelly is 2-1 with a 1.71 ERA through three starts. Strezo is 1-1 with a 2.17 ERA through three starts.

But the depth of pitching has been a pleasant surprise for Serrata, who has seen a pitcher like senior Andrew Murray emerge as a dominant option. Through four appearances, Murray has posted a 2-0 record and has yet to surrender an earned run this season. And senior Blake Stevens tossed six shutout frames in Saturday’s shutout victory, with senior Jake Ratcliffe closing it out with a scoreless seventh.

Serrata said the Knights auditioned a lot of pitchers through non-league play, and each one of them made a case for earning innings in PAL Bay Division play this season.

“We feel like we’re going to be able to use (all of) them,” Serrata said. “Everyone who went out had a chance and kind of stayed in the running.”

Hillsdale opened Bay Division play early, splitting a two-game series with the King’s Academy. The Knights host Burlingame Wednesday at 4 p.m., and Serrata — Hillsdale’s co-manager, along with William Baroncini — is counting on catcher junior catcher Blake Cowans to control the Panthers’ running game.

Cowans’s arm has been a weapon this season, Serrata said. But Burlingame has stolen 33 bases in 38 attempts through eight games thus far.

“It’s just straight respect,” Serrata said. “You see him throw and teams don’t want to run. … Burlingame will certainly run.”

Mateo lefty fronts rotation

San Mateo is the only one of the city’s three public schools not playing in the Bay Division. The Bearcats open PAL Ocean play Tuesday at Woodside and are riding high after juniors Victor Angulo and Myles Guerrero combined for a two-hit shutout Saturday. Angulo claimed his first varsity win, working four innings while facing just one batter over the minimum and striking out eight. Guerrero entered amid a 9-0 San Mateo lead but earned the regulation save with three innings of work, striking out seven.

Senior left-hander Austin Lachapelle has been the workhorse of the rotation, notching a 1-1 record with a 1.47 ERA through five appearances. The southpaw has shown a wild streak, issuing 17 walks and six hit batsmen, but has navigated with 32 strikeouts through 19 innings of work.

“Our pitching’s been great,” San Mateo manager Neal Goldstein said. “Our No. 1 is Austin Lachapelle, and I’ll let him go the whole game if he’s got pitches left.”

The lefty Angulo and right-hander Evan Soller were both offseason acquisitions. The two juniors both attended Serra last year but transferred to San Mateo. Because neither of them played baseball at Serra last season, they did not have to sit out due to Central Coast Section transfer rules at the start of this year.

And the Bearcats have even more reinforcement arms on the way. Chad Hawkins — a senior who has been mashing as San Mateo’s starting third baseman — is currently on the shelf as a pitcher after working three shutout innings of relief early in the season. Goldstein said he expects Hawkins to return to the mound in the short-term.

“I feel good,” Goldstein said of San Mateo’s chances in the PAL Ocean race. “I think we can contend. We’ve got the good pitching.”

Aragon picks up where it left off

The Dons are technically in first place in the PAL Bay Division. Having started the league season with an early two-game sweep of TKA, Aragon is the first team to win two games in PAL Bay play this year. The Dons have now won six straight league games dating back to last season, when they streaked late to claim second place in the Bay.

“That was just a culmination of three years,” Souza said. “That was arguably the best team I’ve coached at Aragon. It all came together at the right time.”

This year’s team is contending with a lot of turnover, but the results are still there. Especially the pitching results.

Mori improved his record to 2-1 Saturday with six shutout innings against Mills, allowing just three hits while striking out seven. Moniz-Witten is pacing the staff with a 3-0 record and a 1.42 ERA through 24 2/3 innings.

“I feel like we have two dudes we could roll out there that could be aces on other teams’ staffs,” Souza said.

With the PAL Bay schedule getting into full swing this week, Aragon resumes league play Wednesday at Carlmont. The Scots are in the mix to contend for a league title, and are currently tied with Aragon with six overall wins. Capuchino — opening Bay Division play Wednesday at Sequoia — owns the Bay’s best overall record at 9-2.

“Even though we have two league games under our belt, I feel like we’re still really trying to figure out what we’re capable of,” Souza said. “Seven games doesn’t seem like that much.”

The Dons are looking forward to their second league series April 4-8 against Burlingame. Last season, on its home turf, Aragon was knocked out of the CCS Division III tournament in the semifinals by the Panthers, who went on to claim the CCS crown. Aragon led the game 2-0 heading into the fifth before Burlingame erupted for a six-run rally en route to an 8-2 win.

But Souza offered no projections for how the Bay Division shapes up this season.

“I feel like championships in the Bay happen, you don’t plan for them,” Souza said.