Sports
YOUTH SPORTS: Milpitas Reds Fall in Little League Seniors Title Game
Big seven run second inning pushes Berryessa past Reds on Monday night in San Jose.
Baseball fans were treated to a good ole’ fashioned slugfest in the championship game of the Little League Senior Division at Piedmont Hills High in San Jose yesterday.
The Milpitas Little League Reds landed the first blow, but a seven-run outburst in the following inning by the host Berryessa team proved to be too much to overcome.
Berryessa avenged a regular season defeat to Milpitas and topped the Reds 10-8 Monday night in San Jose to win the senior division championship.
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Elijah Reyes, Brent Kuhne and Brandon Dietzman all scored runs for the Reds in the top half of the first inning, putting the visitors quickly on top.
Berryessa pushed one run across in their half of the frame, but landed the big blow of the night in the bottom half of the second.
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Ahead 4-1, the Milpitas defense committed back-to-back errors to open the inning. Berryessa cranked out six hits, one walk and eventually scored seven runs in the inning to take an 8-4 lead after two innings of play.
“That second inning was huge,” Milpitas Reds head coach Gabe Espitia said. “We gave them a couple extra outs. A good team like them will score those runs.”
Edwin Sevilla jolted an RBI single to right field in the third for the Reds to close the gap to only three, but that advantage soon widened after a pair of Berryessa runs crossed in the bottom half.
Kuhne entered the game in the middle of the second inning on the mound and held the fort down nicely for the Reds.
Milpitas rattled off two more scores in the fourth, inching in a little closer to the navy-clad hosts.
“Berryessa is a good team,” Espitia said. “We didn’t play the defense we usually do today and that hurt us.”
Dietzman touched home for the final run of the evening in the seventh for the Reds. A ground ball out ended things during the next at-bat.
Coach Espitia and the Reds team will hit the field as the Milpitas Little League Senior Division All-Star team on Friday.
Two new players will join the squad as they open the double elimination tournament on Friday evening at the Milpitas Sports Complex. First pitch is slated for 5:30 pm.
