Encinitas Little League's 10-11 All-Stars Still in the Hunt

The Encinitas Little League 10- and 11-year-old All-Stars will have to beat a tough Park View team twice over the next two days to reach their goal of a berth in the Southern California championship series, but at least their season is continuing after an 8-7 win over Highland LL of San Bernardino at Chollas Lake on Tuesday evening.

Encinitas built an 8-1 lead in the SoCal South Sub-Division elimination game on the strength of a two-run homer by JJ Rytz and grand slam by Alec Varteressian.

ELL was up 8-3 when Bryce Buscher left after a solid 85-pitch, five-plus-inning performance. Highland was able to battle back to make it a one-run game in the top of the sixth, but ELL held on to make it to the "Final Four" of the tournament along with Park View of Chula Vista and the two North Sub-Division finalists. The North and South winners will meet in a best-of-three series for the SoCal crown.

Many of these players were South Sub-Division finalists last year as part of the 9-10 ELL All-Star team. Wednesday's game with Park View, which is unbeaten and edged Encinitas 10-8 on Monday, begins at 5:30 p.m. at Chollas Lake. A win by ELL would set up another game at the same time on Thursday.