The Arden Juniors completed their run deep into the playoffs Tuesday July 13th with a loss under the lights in the Championship game against Sunrise at C-Bar-C Ranch. Congratulations to the Junior All Stars for a great play-off run.

Games are done at Arden for the season. Please watch your emails and the website for fallball announcements sometime between now and the end of the summer break.

July 6, 2010 (Valley Oak Park RED) – This was a great baseball game.

Two pitchers battling tooth and nail. Not a lot of hits. Great plays in the field. A 1-1 tie going into the 6th inning. But the Rosemont All-Stars got two runs in the final inning and survived a one-out solo home run by Andrew Wiesenfarth in the bottom half of the inning to record an exciting 3-2 victory.

Max Buzzard of Arden and #99 Ryno both pitched masterfully in their efforts to keep their team undefeated through two games played. Buzzard went 5 1/3 innings, striking out seven batters while allowing just three hits. Ryno went 5 2/3 surrendering two runs on four hits while also striking out seven Arden batters. #7 Enriquez came into the game to record the final out with a strikeout.

Arden got the first run of the game when Wiesenfarth and Buzzard went back-to-back with doubles in the first inning. The Arden lead held until the fourth inning when Rosemont led off with a double by the clean-up hitter #2 Anguiano. Anguiano advanced to third base on a passed ball and scored on a sacrifice groundout by #42 Robinson.

The game was tied 1-1 until the 6th inning. Buzzard gave up a lead-off single and then struck out a batter before giving way to Wiesenfarth. Wiesenfarth forced Robinson to hit a ball up the middle. It was smothered by second baseman Alex Wormald, but the runners were safe. #17 Vargas then hit the second pitch toward first base. No play was made and now the bases were loaded. Rosemont was able to score two runs on bases loaded full-count walks before the side was retired.

In the bottom half of the 6th, Tomas Buchmiller grounded out to the pitcher for the first out. Wiesenfarth then put a spark in the offense when he hit his second home run in as many games. This one went to center field and was caught … by his dad John. What a great moment. Buzzard would fly out for the second out. Jordan Vujovich got Arden’s fourth hit of the game. That forced Ryno out of the game, but Enriquez came in and was able to end the game with a strikeout.

Arden will now face Foothill Farms tomorrow (July 7, 2010) at 6 p.m. This is an elimination game. The winner of tomorrow will play Thursday against Rosemont. Danny Miller will get the start for Arden tomorrow.

OTHER NOTES:

• Shortstop Mason LaFond wasn’t able to play in the game due to an elbow injury. It is not certain when LaFond will return to the lineup.
• Arden put 14 of 22 balls in play against Rosemont.
• The four hits came from the first three spots in the lineup.

The first game is always the toughest.

But, thanks to a 2-hitter and 13-strikeout performance by Marco Petrucci and an offense that banged out 11 hits, the Arden Major All-Stars can breathe easier thanks to a 9-0 shutout of Foothill Farms in their tournament opener.

With the victory, Arden will move on to play Rosemont who were 12-0 winners over Sunrise on Tuesday night.

Andrew Wiesenfarth led the way offensively for Arden with three hits including a solo homerun in the sixth inning that made the score 7-0. Wiesenfarth was one of eight players who had hits on the evening. The breakthrough inning for Arden came in the third when the team produced three runs on an RBI-double by Max Buzzard followed by an RBI-infield single from Petrucci. Petrucci then scored while trying to steal third base and then went home on an errant throw.

Petrucci was masterful. His only walk was to the lead-off hitter. Foothill Farms had an infield single in the first inning and a single to right field in the sixth inning. Outside of that, Arden was rock solid making four plays in the field.

The big stat for Arden was 24 of 28 balls were put in play by the offense. Other hits on the evening came from Doug McDonald, Alex Wormald, Andrew Finnecy, David Callahan, and Tomas Buchmiller. Wiesenfarth’s home run was to left field.

The Arden Minor Twins won their first TOC game 3-2 Thursday evening at Northridge Little League. Matt Enos pitched 5 strong innings giving up one run and striking out 12 Rosemont batters in route to the win. Kyle Young pitched a strong 6th inning to get the save. Wills Vlasek stole home after doubling that proved to be the winning run. The Twins play again on Saturday at 10:00am at Northridge Little League.

The Northridge Cubs outlasted the Arden Blue Jays. The game started on Monday and ended on Tuesday after it was suspended for darkness. A well-struck single with the bases loaded and two outs by Northridge ended the game in extra innings.

The Blue Jays streaked out to a 5-0 lead in the top of the first using only 5 batters. Josh Davis capped the inning with a booming inside the park home run.

The Cubs chipped away, finally taking an 8-6 lead in the 4th inning. The Blue Jays tied the score in the top of the 6th. JP McKeever singled and later scored on a hard hit ground ball by Carter Benbrook. Ryan Nixon then scored the 8th run by alertly swiping home on a wild pitch.

The Blue Jays forced extra innings with a remarkable play at the plate. With two outs and a runner on second, the Cubs hit a solid single to left field. Ryan Maves cleanly played the ball and made a strong relay to JP McKeever. JP turned and made a perfect throw the plate where Ryan Nixon caught the ball and made a great tag ahead of the sliding runner.

Unfortunately, the Blue Jays could not score in their half of the 7th inning. The Cubs loaded the bases with no one out, but Cole Ramazzini bore down and got the next two batters. The first on a force out at the plate on a ball hit back to the mound and the second on a strike out. That is when the ruling to suspend the game was made.

The Blue Jays showed a ton of heart and class during both days of this crazy game. They made Arden Little League proud. Go Twins!

The Minor Twins will also be representing the Arden Little League in the Minors TOCs. Their first game is Thursday, June 6th at Northridge Little League.

Both teams won 14 out of 18 games on the season. Congratulations to both of them for an excellent season.

The Arden Red Sox defeated the Arden Twins Wednesday in the rubber match of their 3 games this season. After getting beat 7-1 this past Saturday by a tough Twins team, the Red Sox showed their resiliency by defeating the Twins by a score of 15-9 on Wednesday night to conclude the home season for each team.

Shaun Dhillon and John Manley led the way with stout pitching allowing 9 hits to the tough Twin lineup. Geoff Luoma led the way for the Red Sox scoring 4 runs and Mike Fanfelle scored 3 times for the winners.

Santa Cruz’s Giant Dipper had nothing on this high scoring roller coaster of a game between the Phillies and the Yankees.  The Yankees  got off the line early with two runs, leading the game for the first two innings.  The powerful Phillies answered with five runs to take the lead in the top of three, but in the same inning the Yankees fought back to tie it up with three runs including a Jordan Vujovich HR (7 for the year).  The game went scoreless in the fourth, but the Phillies turned up the offensive heat for the last two innings bringing the score to 9-5 after their at bat in the top of six.  With three outs to play and anxious for the thrill of a comeback, the Yankees weren’t about to let the wheels fall of this wild ride.  After the first six batters had their chances, five had reached base safely and two runs had scored bringing the Yankees down by two with one out, bases loaded, and John Olsen at the plate.  Olsen drove a hard grounder to second, in an effort to turn the 4-6-3 double play all chaos ensued:   the force out was made at 2nd, Olsen reached 1st safely, the runner at 3rd scored (9-8), the runner at 2nd took a chance and headed for home, the defense overthrew home and the run scored (9-9), on the throw to home Olsen headed to 2nd while in the mean time the previously forced out runner at 2nd was trotting off the field to the 3rd base dugout, the catcher picked up the ball and mistakenly overthrew 3rd in attempt to make a play on the not in play previously thrown out runner trotting off the field to the 3rd base dugout, Olsen advanced from 2nd to home and scored the game winning run. Final score, 9-10 Yankees.

In the spirit of the classic big league Giants-Dodgers rivalry, the Arden teams battled back and forth in a game decided on the final play of the game. The Dodgers were down by two runs but rallying in the top of the 5th with the bases loaded and one out. The Dodgers’ batter hit a hard ground ball to the Giants’ shortstop, who fielded it cleanly and fired to first; Hayden Powell, the Giants’ firstbaseman, made a great scoop of a throw in the dirt, then fired a strike to home where the would be tying run was instead tagged for the final out of the game.