Fountain Valley’s Nathan Wilson tosses two-hit gem at Los Alamitos

In the Sunset League, any small mistake could be costly, and Los Alamitos High paid after it couldn’t figure out Fountain Valley pitcher Nathan Wilson.

The senior threw a two-hit shutout to lead Fountain Valley to a 3-0 victory over the host Griffins in Friday’s league opener.

Wilson went with his two best pitches, the slider and curveball, while trusting his defense. He struck out four and walked one.

His offense took advantage of a couple of mistakes by Los Alamitos’ defense.

“I just had to make sure I had command of the secondary pitch,” said Wilson, who threw 75 pitches. “Both my slider and my curveball were working great, but I stuck with my slider more than my curve. I just had to get those over and pound the ball low, outside, away, everywhere. I had to trust my defense.”

The Griffins’ defense led to the Barons (6-3 overall) striking in the third inning.

The Barons got on base with two outs in the top of the third inning after Jake Bitzer grounder to third base was poorly thrown to first base, advancing Bitzer to second base. Conrad Villafuerte would single to right field, scoring Bitzer.

In the next inning, Cedrick Perez drew a one-out walk and was ready to steal second. The Los Alamitos (3-4) defense was ready for the steal, but not for the hit-and-run play. Noah Amenta hit the ball between second and third base, sending Perez to third. Jake Brooks singled to left field to bring Perez home and make it 2-0.

In the fifth inning, Villafuerte singled to left field and moved to third on a double down the third-base line by Sebastian Murillo. Villafuerte, a senior, scored on a wild pitch to make it 3-0.

It was more than enough support for Wilson, who didn’t give up a hit after the third inning.

“You have to take advantage of small mistakes,” Fountain Valley coach Deric Yanagisawa said. “In the Sunset League, every game is going to be close. It doesn’t matter who is playing, every game is going to be close. If you don’t play good baseball in this league, you can’t expect to win. You can’t expect to win if you’re going to play sloppy. We had to come in here and we had to play a good game.”

Los Alamitos’ Brayden Englert threw 4 1/3 innings while giving up two earned runs on six hits to take the loss. Englert had one of his team’s two hits.

Los Alamitos will be back on its field on Saturday. The Griffins host Loara in a nonleague game at 11 a.m., before they return to league action at Edison on Wednesday.

Villafuerte and Brooks each went two for four with a run batted in, and Amenta was two for four as well. Fountain Valley travels to Newport Harbor on Wednesday. The Sailors lost to Huntington Beach 8-6 in their league opener on Thursday.

“It was just … mistakes that were the difference,” Los Alamitos coach Matt Nuez said. “On top of that, you have to tip your cap to Wilson. He did a heck of a job. That’s baseball. We are one game in and we just have to get after it. We are a very resilient group, so we just have to go forward. Wilson did a great job commanding off-speed [pitches] against us. He located well and he was very efficient with his pitches.”

MANNY ALVAREZ is a contributor to Times Community News. Follow him on Twitter: @MAlvarez02