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Sultans hold lead, easy as “won”-2-3
- Updated: April 21, 2023
2023 EAST COUNTY PREP BASEBALL
By Nick Pellegrino
ECS Senior writer
SANTEE – The word is small and spelled in several varities, yet they are all meaningful for the Santana Sultans.
Although it was just “”one” ballgame, giving Santana a lead of “one” game in the Grossmont Hills League, Riday’s (Apr. 21) contest with GHL co-leader Grossmont meant more than “one” thing — they “won.”
Buoyed behind a brilliant one-hit shutout by Destin Allen-Fox, the Sultans snapped the first-place showdown by swamping the visiting Foothillers, 7-0. All of the runs in the contest came in the fifth inning, as a stellar pitchers’ duel against the Hillers’ Gabe Sanz-Miller look more “one-“sided than the actual truth when a bushel of errors turned four of the runs into unearned markers.
Allen-Fox struck out six Hillers batters without issuing a walk, The lone hit was a one-out line single to center field by Mac Cervantes in the second. However, the runner was promptly picked off, with no other Grossmont batter reaching base until a tiring Allen-Fox hit the first two batters of th eventh., yet perserved theshutout with a strikeout, a soft line out, then a tapper back to the mound.
The seven-run explosion resulted in an extreme showing of “small ball” after the first four batters all singled. The first three came from the bottom third of the Santana batting order, then leadoff batter Lucas Kelly registered a basehit to center for an RBI to open the game’s initial run.
The result was just a single run, but the psychological ramifications were tremendous.
An error on Kelly’s basehit brought home a second run. Two batters later, another defensive miscue opened the floodgates for four additional runs.
Following Kelly, Santana RBI were credited to Landen Bailey, then two for Allen-Fox on his basehit.
Santana (11-6 overall, 4-0 GHL) also received two hit from center fielder Bradley Phillips,
The good news for Grossmont (7-11, 3-1 GHL) is the contest was just one game, gaining a re-match with the Sultans at Gizoni Field next Tuesday at 4 p.m. The Foothillers are a half-game in front of idel Granite Hills.
