Saugus Needs 10 Innings to Beat Montclair

Saugus High pitcher Dennis Moran was just a sophomore on the 1984 Saugus High baseball team that lost to Laguna Hills in the Southern Section 2-A Division semifinals.

He wasn’t about to come within one win of going to the championship again, just to be sent home in tears.

He was going to win--even if he had to work overtime.

Moran had to do just that Tuesday night in the semifinals.

The senior right-hander held Montclair to only one run through six-plus innings, but it was his two-run single to center in the top of the 10th inning that broke a 1-1 tie, enabling the Centurions to come away with a 6-3 victory at Upland Memorial Park.

Saugus (20-7) meets Artesia at Dodger Stadium on Saturday afternoon. Artesia defeated Mission Viejo, 5-0, on Tuesday,

“We lost it in the ninth two years ago,” Moran said. “There was no way we were going to let that happen again.”

It looked as if neither team would ever break the tie.

Saugus scored its run in the first, but Montclair pitcher Derek Parks retired 19 of the next 20 batters. The Centurions finally caught up with him in the 10th, when catcher Gene Northway led off with a double off the wall in right.

John Meyers, who singled and scored in the first, then walked, and both Northway and Meyers scored two outs later on Moran’s single to center.

Parks then walked Don Pedersen and was replaced by first baseman Doug Pierce.

Chris Joy greeted him with a double to right, which scored Moran and Pedersen. Joy moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on a single by Tom Dodson.

Montclair rallied for two runs--a two-run homer to center by Parks--in the bottom half of the inning, but reliever Kent Gustaveson retired the next three hitters to gain the win and send the Centurions to Dodger Stadium for their first-ever appearance in the championship.

Gustaveson, Saugus’ No. 1 pitcher at the start of the season before he injured his shoulder, came on in relief of Moran with one on and no one out in the seventh and retired the first six batters he faced.

The Centurions had a chance to take a 2-1 lead in the top of the seventh, when Joy singled to center with two outs. Saugus Coach Doug Worley replaced Joy with pinch runner Jim Fritz, but Parks picked him off first to end the inning.

Moran, who threw a one-hitter against Capistrano Valley in the second round, was almost as brilliant as Parks in the early-going.

He struck out five, hit a batter and gave up six hits before leaving.

Montclair, which had never advanced in the playoffs farther than the second round, finished 24-6.

The Cavaliers had an opportunity to take control of the game in the fourth. Trailing, 1-0, Parks led off with a single to center and later scored on a base hit by sophomore third baseman Monsel Fields.

Fields’ single to left also sent Dave Hernandez, who was earlier hit by a pitch, to second.

Jason Hosea then followed Fields with a single to left, but Gustaveson, who was playing left field, threw a no-bounce strike to catcher Gene Northway at the plate to nail Hernandez.