Falcons lose final game of tournament
The Atwater High baseball team struggled on defense through the first three days of the tournament. In the final game, the Falcons’ bats couldn’t get going as Douglas defeated Atwater 3-1 in the third-place game of the 57th Annual Fran Oneto/Atwater-Winton Lions Easter Tournament at Memorial Ballpark on Thursday night.
Atwater (3-9) opened the game with a run in the first inning against Douglas (Minden, Nev.) as Wyatt Pimentel and Noah Torres hit back-to-back singles to lead off the game. Pimentel and Torres advanced on a double steal and Pimentel scored on a line out to right field off the bat of Jacob Parker to give the Falcons a 1-0 lead.
However, Haden Keller and Jayden Foster combined to shut out Atwater the rest of the way.
“We were a lot better defensively today, but we struggled a bit with our bats,” said Atwater coach Jarrod Pimentel.
Atwater starting pitcher Cameron Pacheco weaved his way in and out of trouble in the first three innings before leaving with an injury in the fourth.
Douglas’ Logan Fenel tied the game with a run-scoring single in the first inning and the Tigers (5-9) threatened to take the lead with the bases loaded, but Pacheco struck out Trevor Tierney to get out of the jam.
Pacheco walked four, hit a batter and gave up five hits before he left with one out in the fourth inning and the Falcons trailing 2-1.
“He missed his spots a little bit,” Pimentel said. “He wasn’t helping himself out there with the walks and hit batter, but he was able to get out of the jams he created for himself.”
The Falcons couldn’t come up with the big hit as they left two runners on base in the second, third and fourth innings.
There was a scary incident in the sixth inning when home plate umpire Jon Derr was hit in the face by a bat. Derr was walking to see if a ball went out of play down the first-base line when he walked into a practice swing of Keller, who was on deck.
The game was delayed 45 minutes as emergency personnel attended to Derr.
“Jon’s a good friend and he was my coach in high school,” Pimentel said. “I really respect him a lot. I’m still shaken up about it. He’ll be OK. He lost a couple teeth and has a gash on his lip, but he’ll be all right.”
The game was finished with just one umpire as Douglas added an insurance run on a sacrifice bunt by Tomas Leitenbauer to give the Tigers a 3-1 lead.
Foster then retired the Falcons in order in the seventh inning to pick up the save.
One bright spot for Atwater was it only committed one error after 15 errors in the first three games.
“I think offensively this has been a pretty good tournament for us and we pitched well,” Pimentel said. “It hasn’t been a good tournament for us defensively. That’s something we’re going to have to work on hard next week against Turlock.”
Redwood Christian 9, Livingston 6 at Atwater – The Eagles scored five runs in the first inning to jump out to a big lead early in the fifth-place game.
Livingston trailed 9-2 going into the seventh inning and scored four times in the frame. Eddie Avila led the Wolves’ 10-hit offensive attack by going 3-for-3 with a double and two runs. Blake Jantz added two hits and drove in two runs with a first-inning single.
This story was originally published March 31, 2016 at 7:49 PM with the headline "Falcons lose final game of tournament."