Whisenant’s plans ring true as La Cañada baseball clinches share of title
La Cañada - The greatest baseball player in La Cañada High history finally knows what it feels like to win a Rio Hondo League title.
Nearly three decades following the conclusion of his All-CIF playing career with the Spartans, Matt Whisenant continued the impressive impact in his first season as La Cañada head coach, celebrating a 7-2 victory Tuesday over visiting San Marino that secured at least a share of the program’s ninth league championship in six decades and first title since 2013.
“It’s very gratifying. It’s nice to be a part of it and makes it extra special that I’m doing it at my alma mater,” said Whisenant, a 1989 graduate who only placed as high as second in league during his La Cañada playing career. “I never thought this would come around the corner and when it did last summer, there was some time to think about what would be the most rational decision. And rational or irrational, it always came back to me saying to myself, ‘I’d love to come here and make a change and make a difference.’”
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Whisenant, who played professionally for 12 years and spent four seasons – including 1997 with the World Series champion Florida Marlins – with three Major League Baseball teams, had won three straight Olympic League championships from 2014-16 coaching at Village Christian. He also guided the Crusaders to the 2014 CIF Southern Section Division V final.
But after La Cañada missed the playoffs in four of the past five seasons, helping the Spartans (16-5, 8-0 in league) rebuild a winning culture was an opportunity Whisenant couldn’t pass up and a challenge he embraced.
“At the first parent meeting we had at the Buchanans’ house in the summer, the first thing I wanted to make sure the kids knew is that I was guaranteeing these kids could win league if they believed in the process and worked hard. There was no doubt we could do it,” Whisenant said. “It’s just nice to see that all the hard work they’ve put in has been paying off.
“I think it’s just one of those snowball effects when you start having some success and then you start understanding where that success comes from and how important the process is, these kids want more.”
After defeating Village Christian – where Whisenant won 134 games in nine years – during a winter league game in January, La Cañada senior pitcher Matthew Sox (4-1) knew the Spartans were capable of meeting their coach’s expectations during the spring.
“A lot us have known him since we were 11 and 12 playing over in Pasadena. He’s done it at Village and he’s shown that he can do it here. He breaks down the game in a good way that clicks with us,” said Sox, who pitched six innings and allowed five hits and an unearned run Tuesday, striking out nine. “He laid out what it would be like to win and he gave us a plan that would help us win and it’s just been a goal we’ve been striving for every day.
“We knew we had a lot of talent and we knew we could, but (beating Village Christian) was an epiphany moment where we were like, ‘OK, we can compete with pretty much any team, we just have to come out and play our game.’”
La Cañada, which won its sixth game in a row, scored three runs in the fourth and added four more in the sixth against the Titans, with Connor Buchanan collecting doubles in each inning and driving in a pair of runs. Graham Massimino had a two-run triple in the fourth, with Sox adding a triple and scoring a run in the sixth, along with runs batted in from Tristan Kalnins and Conner Schulz.
San Marino (8-11, 4-4), the last league opponent to score against La Cañada on April 7, snapped the Spartans’ streak of 28 consecutive innings without allowing a run in the fifth when a single by Ryan Sabin drove in Austin Urbach. Kalnins, pitching in relief of Sox, allowed an unearned run in the seventh.