Strong pitching, timely hitting lead Dons to win

They played two non-league games last week, both wins, and returned to Ocean Division play by hosting El Camino Tuesday afternoon at Aragon.

The Colts have also played well this season and they went pitch-for-pitch with the Dons through the first half of the game.

But with the game tied at 1-all in the bottom of the fourth, a Cam Grant three-run bomb gave Aragon the cushion it would need to post a 6-2 victory — the Dons’ sixth straight win and three in a row in division play.

“The first win of any series is huge,” said Aragon manager Lenny Souza. “You can’t sweep a team without winning on Tuesday. If you want to be a postseason team, you have to sweep some teams.”

Aragon (4-1 PAL Ocean, 10-3 overall) will get its chance to take the two-game series from El Camino (2-2, 5-5) when they face off in South San Francisco Thursday.

The Dons will have to be on top of their game if they want to complete the sweep because the Colts gave Aragon all it could handle.

Aragon starting pitcher Conor Hourigan and his El Camino counterpart Justin Keegan hooked up in a pitching duel for the first three innings.

Keegan allowed one run on four hits through the first three innings, his only mistake coming on a pitch to Hourigan, who hit it out to right for a solo home run in the bottom of the first.

But the Colts got to Hourigan in the top of the fourth, manufacturing a run when Jacob Soto singled, went to second on a Gunnar Rullhausen sacrifice bunt, took third on Keegan’s second infield hit of the game and scored on a wild pitch.

The Colts had a chance to take the lead, but a Hourigan strikeout with the bases loaded snuffed the potential rally.

In the bottom of the inning, the Dons took advantage of their rally. With a run already on a Thomas Calvo RBI fielder’s choice, the Dons got a single from Jace Jeremiah to put runners on first and second as Grant came to the plate. He took ball one and, on the second offering, whipped it over the fence in right field for an opposite-field, three-run shot that gave the Dons a 5-1 advantage. It was Grant’s fourth home run of the season.

“The fourth inning was a big inning,” Hourigan said, who worked into the seventh inning before hitting the 110-pitch limit.

“I was excited when [Grant] hit that.”

Keegan was lifted after that hit, with his final line being five runs allowed on eight hits. He and reliever Ryan Thompson combined to strikeout nine.

Souza knew sooner or later the top of his lineup would get something going, so it was no surprise his leadoff and No. 2 hitter, Jeremiah and Grant, factored into the Dons’ big inning.

“Cam and Jace don’t go 0-fer too often,” Souza said. “I knew one of them would do something to make an impact.”

That four-run fourth gave Hourigan some breathing room and he took advantage. After allowing four hits and walking four through four innings, he allowed only one more hit over his final two-plus innings of work — a one-out triple to Levi Stubbles in the seventh.

Other than that, Hourigan was in control. He went on to finish with 10 strikeouts and was his sixth walk away from finishing the game.

“I could have had better command,” Hourigan said. “But, overall, we won, 6-2.”

Aragon tacked on an insurance run in the bottom of the fifth as Matt Mukai, who had two of Aragon’s 10 hits, legged out an infield hit to open the fifth. He went to second on a Sterling Miller single to left and took third on a passed ball before Evan Donath worked a walk after falling behind 0-2 to load the bases.

A pair of strikeouts brought up Calvo, who eventually took an RBI walk to push the Dons’ lead to 6-1. It was Calvo’s second RBI of the game.

Stubbles, who had two of the Colts’ five hits, tripled and then scored on a passed ball in the seventh to round out the scoring for the day.

“Conor, he was awesome. He was in some holes, but he stopped digging pretty quickly,” Souza said. “Conor got their better hitters out, or at least didn’t let them hurt us.”