South City falls in CCS baseball finals

South City’s historic run came up short, however, as the No. 2-seed Warriors (23-6) fell 18-8 to No. 1 Stevenson-Pebble Beach Thursday afternoon at Excite Ballpark. While the lead changed hands three times, and as late as the fourth inning, the Pirates ultimately walked off in five innings via the 10-run mercy-rule.

“Obviously tonight, they got the best of us,” Warriors head coach Matt Schaukowitch said. “They hammered the ball.”

Stevenson (19-8) came out swinging with loud contact from the outset, and racked up 17 hits in the game. With South City taking an 8-7 lead in the top of the fourth, the Pirates took charge of the game in the bottom of the inning, sending 10 batters to the plate amid a five-run rally.

Two strange fielding errors led to Stevenson scoring the tying run. After leadoff batter Reggie Bell got hit by a pitch, he advanced to third on an errant pickoff throw to first. When South City attempted to pick off Bell at third, the throw again went wayward, allowing him to jog home to tie it 8-8.

Three straight knocks then gave the Pirates the lead, with cleanup hitter Jacob Hall delivering the go-ahead single to drive home Phinn Thomas.

“They were aggressive,” South City reliever Josh Nabung said. “Any mistake, they really hit.”

Nabung took over at the start of the second inning in relief of junior starting pitcher Gio Bernal. South City used three pitchers in the game, and all struggled with their secondary pitches.

“Yeah, no doubt,” Schaukowitch said. “We couldn’t throw a secondary pitch very well, whether it be a curveball or a changeup, for strikes. And our guys didn’t have by-you fastballs. They weren’t able to get the fastball past you.”

The shaky secondary stuff was a symptom of playing in the Peninsula Athletic League Lake Division, a “C” league in which Warriors pitchers relied on a majority of fastballs throughout the regular season. By virtue of winning the PAL Lake championship this season, the Warriors will move up to the PAL Ocean Division, a more competitive “B” league, next season.

“It’s mostly fastballs (this season),” Schaukowitch said, “but when we do bullpens — we do bullpens on a weekly basis, and as we went down the stretch, we knew this was going to happen. We knew games were going to start to get closer, and we would start focusing up on being able to throw off-speed pitches in two-ball counts, off-speed pitches in three-ball counts. We were constantly working on that I would say within the last month.”

Despite the lopsided score, South City led twice in the game.

The Warriors got on the board with two runs in the first, with an RBI fielder’s choice from Gabe Martin and a bases-loaded walk to Adam Keith, one of three walks Stevenson issued in the inning. It could have been a landslide inning but, with one out, Yordonis Medina-Pineda laced a hard grounder toward the middle, but the shortstop Bell ranged over the middle and took it right to the bag with a crow hop to start a 6-3 double play to retire the side.

Stevenson rode the momentum and came out swinging in the bottom of the inning. Bell opened the frame with a booming triple to left-center, and a barrage of loud contact to follow fueled a six-run rally in which the Pirates batted around, sending 10 batters to the plate.

Nabung took over to start the second and settled the game down long enough for the Warriors to swing their way back ahead. South City rallied for five runs in the top of the third, sending nine batters to the plate, knocking Stevenson starting pitcher Jack Rice out of the game. With one in and three on, Josh Ornelas laced a two-run single to left field to close it to 6-5. Then with two outs, Vince Bernal barreled a two-run double down the right-field line to give the Warriors a 7-6 lead.

“I was hyped,” Vince Bernal said. “It was just a big spot for me. Last year in the playoffs, I didn’t do nothing. So, I finally felt like I accomplished something. So, it felt good. But I knew the game wasn’t over, obviously. That team had fight too.”

In the bottom of the inning, a string of defensive miscues by South City put the Pirates back on top. Stevenson scratched out one run in the bottom of the third thanks to two errors and two wild pitches.

Jack Bucich reached on an infield error to start the inning. He moved to third on two consecutive wild pitches. Then with one out, Brady Mugan bunted up the first-base line. Bucich held at third on the play, but the South City first baseman made an unnecessary toss to the second baseman covering with the runner right in front of him, and the short toss was mishandled allowing Mugan to reach.

Alex Wang then produced a sacrifice fly to left — which would have been the third out of the inning — to bring home Bucich to tie it 8-8.

The Warriors took the lead back in the fourth against Pirates reliever Soren Hillman. Martin led off with a walk and promptly stole second. After Nabung drew a two-out walk, Medina-Pineda singled to right to put South City ahead 8-7.

Stevenson responded with 11 runs over the next two innings against Nabung and Vince Bernal to seal the championship.

Bell enjoyed a big day at the plate for Stevenson, going 3 for 4 with four RBIs and two runs scored, and started the pivotal double play to end the first inning and stop the game from spiraling out of control for the Pirates.

South City advanced through the Division VI bracket with a 9-3 home win over North Salinas, and a 6-3 semifinal win over Fremont-Sunnyvale at Schott Stadium.

Schaukowitch said he couldn’t have imagined at the start of the season seeing his team advance in the playoffs to play at both Santa Clara University and at the home of the San Jose Giants.

“We only brought the core four back (from 2024) ... so bringing six or seven kids up from JV ... I wasn’t anticipating any of this,” Schaukowitch said. “To say the least, it was a good run and it was a fun run.”

South City is set to graduate just two starters from this year’s team.

“We all have fight,” Vince Bernal said. “We’re all young, we can all grow. ... We’re playing year-round. Nobody’s playing football, we’re all playing baseball. We’re all committed to this sport. Every one of us wants to win as bad as the other.”