Huntington Beach’s lefties and bats do the right thing against Damien

The Huntington Beach High baseball team has a surplus of left-handed arms.

A day after three combined to throw a one-hitter in a 1-0 road win over Orange Lutheran, ranked No. 2 in the state by CalHiSports.com, the Oilers used four other lefties at home on Thursday. Josh Hahn first took the mound for Huntington Beach and La Verne Damien countered with left-hander Diego Barrera.

The Oilers’ lefties continued to pitch well.

This time, the latest four lefties got more than enough run support. Huntington Beach opened the Frank Lerner Division of the Newport Elks Tournament with a 10-1 win.

Hahn went three innings, striking out three and allowing two infield hits. Zeke Ziegler, Shane Stafford and Jag Burden each threw one inning in relief.

“We’ve had maybe four left-handers in 10 years, and this year we have eight legitimate left-handers that we can use,” said Oilers coach Benji Medure, whose team hosts his alma mater, Riverside Poly, in the tournament on Saturday at 11 a.m. “We’re actually hoping for right-handers. We have a couple and we’re going to use them.”

While the lefties combined to give up four hits and strike out seven, everything went right offensively for the Oilers (2-2). Huntington Beach recorded six doubles, two by Hahn and one by Ken Takada, Jake Vogel, Burden and Nick Lopez.

Those big hits ruined Damien’s season opener.

The Oilers jumped on Barrera, a senior bound for the University of Washington, early. Five of the first six batters reached base, and all scored. Burden and Lopez each singled in a run, and with the bases loaded, Takada cleared them with a shot into the gap in right-center field. Huntington Beach took a 5-0 lead.

“We just rocked him pretty good,” Hahn said of Barrera, who was charged with eight earned runs and nine hits in 1 2/3 innings. “He was throwing a lot of off-speed pitches, trying to get us out in front, but we stayed back.”

Damien appeared it might respond in the second inning.

Hahn walked Connor Bartholomew and Jacob Coleman to start the second inning. The next batter, Matthew Clark, showed that he wanted to move the runners up with a sacrifice bunt, but Hahn’s first three pitches to Clark were balls.

The next three offerings were strikes, the last two Clark missed while trying to bunt. Hahn got out of the situation, striking out the next batter as well before fielding a bunt toward the third-base line and firing to first to get the third out.

Huntington Beach hammered Barrera right away in the second inning, as its first three hitters doubled. Vogel led off with a double toward the third-base line, and Hahn drove in Vogel by going the other way to left field. Burden, who was two for three with two runs batted in, a walk and two runs, picked up Hahn with a ground-rule double to right field. The Oilers added a third run in the second inning, on Lopez’s double to right-center field to go up 8-0.

“They had a great approach,” Damien coach Andy Nieto said of the Oilers, who totaled 11 hits. “You spot anybody five runs in the first, now you’re playing catch up. That’s a recipe for disaster.”

The Spartans scored in the top of the third on a throwing error, ending the Oilers’ 12-inning scoreless streak, which dated back to the second game of a doubleheader at San Jose Bellarmine Prep on Feb. 24.

Hahn started the first game against Bellarmine Prep, getting the loss after throwing five solid innings in a 2-1 setback. The junior committed to UCLA did not have to go past three innings in his second outing of the year.

“It was a tough weekend up in San Jose,” Medure said of losing twice to Bellarmine Prep, the same program the Oilers beat to win the Boras Classic state tournament title last year at UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium. “I thought we played well enough to win both games, and we just didn’t pull [them] out. To play well enough to win [Wednesday] night [against Orange Lutheran], and actually win was a confidence boost.”

Hahn said the momentum definitely carried over to Thursday. Hahn helped his cause by going two for three with two RBIs and two runs. His second RBI double extended the lead to 9-1 in the third inning.

Lopez, his catcher who was two for two with three RBIs, walked with the bases loaded to make it a nine-run game in the third. Three innings is all the Oilers needed from Hahn, who threw 62 pitches.

Hahn and left-hander Nate Madole, a senior headed to Loyola Marymount, are Huntington Beach’s top two starters. But Medure also said he has confidence in lefty Dylan Ramirez, who threw five hitless innings to earn the win against Orange Lutheran.

“It’s a good problem to have,” Hahn said of the number of quality left-handers on the staff. “We have three [right-handers], but our lefties do [the] job. Not many [teams] have lefties, so some guys are scared to face lefties.”

david.carrillo@latimes.com

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