Baseball: Amador Claims First NCS Title with 12-1 Win Against Foothill — Updated

North Coast Section Division I Championship

Amador Valley 12, Foothill 1

Records: Amador Valley 25-3, Foothill 20-8

The Star: Amador's Alex Osterholt pitched 6 1/3 innings of relief, limiting the Falcons to four hits and one runs to lead the Dons to the victory.

The Turning Point: Tommy Pluschkell's two-run double in the fourth put the Dons up 4-0 — more than enough for Osterholt.

The Quote: "Honestly, we peaked today," Amador coach Lou Cesario said. "It's the best team I've ever coached and this game puts an exclamation point on the season."

What's Next? Amador gets to celebrate its NCS title.

The Bottom Line: Amador extended its winning streak over Foothill to six games and won its first North Coast Section baseball title in school history. It was also the most complete performance of the season for the Dons against a team third baseman Tommy Pluschkell called "the best team we played all year." Osterholt was phenomenal after relieving Michael Mallory in the first inning, the Dons played flawless defense and banged out 15 hits. Brian Hamm and Pluschkell both registered three hits and Tony Olguin hit an opposite field two-run homer off Foothill starter Michael Theofanopolous, who was chased out of the game in the third inning. The future looks bright as well: Five of the nine hitters in AV's starting lineup will be back next year along with the team's four best pitchers.

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For a team that has seen many different players step up in crucial situations all year long, it was only fitting that the Amador Valley baseball team wrapped up the best baseball season in Pleasanton history with a complete team effort.

The top-seeded Dons out-played rival Foothill in every facet of Saturday's North Coast Section Division I championship to put an exclamation point the year with a 12-1 win at Dougherty Valley High.

"Team-wise this has been the best team I've ever coached," Amador coach Lou Cesario said. "They do everything well. They pitch, they can run, they play defense, they hit, but I think the best quality about this team is that they love each other and did everything they were asked to do."

Junior pitcher Alex Osterhotl was asked to come out of the bullpen with two outs and the bases loaded in the first inning and responded brilliantly. He got the Dons out of the jam with a strike out was nearly untouchable the rest of the game, allowing just four hits and one run in 6 1/3 innings.

"Once I went in there I was planning on throwing strikes and keeping it low — making sure they didn't hit anything far," he said. "You just got to buckle down. You're acting like a starter, basically, coming in in the first inning."

Was it a hard decision to take out Michael Mallory, who finished the year 8-0 on with a 1.34 ERA?

"(Osterholt) has proven throughout the year he's been our most valuable pitcher coming into those tough situations," Cesario said. "It's not that I didn't have confidence in (Mallory), but Alex has been good in those situations. It wasn't a tough decision."

After Osterholt got the Dons out of the early jam, the bats came alive in the following half-inning against Foothill starter Michael Theofanopolous. With two outs, Aaron Hafford singled and Michael Lam followed with a walk before Brian Hamm blooped a run-scoring single to right field. Joey Moroney singled to score Lam and after he stole second, Foothill intentionally walked Keck to load the bases for Tommy Pluschkell.

As he's done all year, Pluschkell came up big with a two-run single to put Amador up 4-0.

"From the get-go, Tommy has been our leader," Cesario said. "Foothill walked Keck quite a few times and he made them play almost every time."

Tony Olguin's two-run opposite-field homer to right field in the third put the Dons up 6-0 and after Theofanopolous walked the following hitter, his day was done. Future Oregon State quarterback Sean Mannion came in in relief and kept the second-seeded Falcons within striking distance for the next few innings.

Mannion, who hadn't gone more than two innings in a game all year, retired eight batters in a row after walking the first batter his faced, but ran out of gas late as the Dons scored six runs in the final two innings — including a three-run inside-the-park home run from Brian Hamm in the seventh.

"As soon as I saw it go by the center fielder when I was rounding first, I knew I was going to score," Hamm said. "It's a great way to end my senior year."

Hamm went 3 for 5 in the game, finished with a .375 batting average and hit safely in 13 of Amador's final 14 games.

"Hamm is the best defensive second baseman I've ever coached," Cesario said. "He practices as hard as he plays. It's unbelievable how everyone feeds off what he does."

Amador came into the game ranked No. 6 in the state by Cal-Hi Sports and No. 7 by MaxPreps.com, which also had the Dons at No. 40 in the nation as of May 31. The Dons will likely finish in the Cal-Hi Sports Top-Five after previous No. 5 Royal of Simi Valley lost 10-0 its in section semifinal game this week.

The top-seeded Dons inked themselves into the record books several times this year with the first league title since 1980 and first section title in school history. They also became the first East Bay Athletic League team to win an NCS baseball title since San Ramon Valley won the 2004 3A East Bay championship as a No. 2 seed.

"Our season was tremendous," Osterholt said. "We've been working hard since August coming to practice every day making sure we did it perfectly. (Beating Foothill) is big. It's a big rivalry and that's six wins in a row against Foothill. Hopefully we can keep it going."

Despite the loss, it'll likely go down as the best season in Foothill history as well. The Falcons advanced to their first NCS title game and all that stood between them and the league and section titles was Amador.

The Falcons got their lone run in the fourth inning when sophomore Brandon Viceral scored from third on a groundout by Will Anderson.

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Amador Valley 12, Foothill 1

Amador Valley (25-3) 042 002 4 — 12 15 0
Foothill (20-8)  000 100 0 — 1 4 1

Amador Valley (ab-r-h) — Hamm 5-3-3, Moroney 4-1-1, Gibbons 1-0-0, Keck 3-0-2, Ulrich 1-0-0, Pluschkell 4-0-3, Johnson 4-0-1, Finn 4-1-1, Olguin 4-1-2, Hafford 2-1-1, Rojas 1-0-0, Lam 0-1-0, Barstow 2-2-1.

Foothill — Owen 3-0-0, Jefferies 2-0-0, Defazio 2-0-1, Theofanopolous 3-0-1, Viceral 2-1-1, Rowland 3-0-1, Anderson 3-0-0, Blades 1-0-0, Moore 1-0-0, Mannion 1-0-0, Slifer 1-0-0, Cmarena 2-0-0.

Pitching
Amador Valley — Mallory 0.2 IP, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 H, 3 BB, 1 K; Osterholt 6.1 IP, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 H, 1 BB, 2 K.
Foothill — Theofanopolous 2.1 IP, 6 R, 6 ER, 8 H, 3 BB, 1 K; Mannion 4 IP, 4 R, 2 ER, 7 H, 1 BB, 3 K; Slifer 0.2 IP, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 H, 0 BB, 0 K.

Batting
2B — Keck (AV), Olguin (AV), Finn (AV), Viceral (F). HR — Olguin (AV), Hamm (AV) RBI — Hamm 4, Keck 2, Pluschkell 2, Olguin 2, Lam, Moroney, Anderson (F).

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