Orange County Prep Review : La Quinta Has a Splitting Image

It has been such a strange baseball season at La Quinta High School that even Coach Dave Demarest gets a little mixed up trying to explain it.

“It hasn’t been a roller-coaster year,” Demarest said. “It’s been more like Hekyll and Jyde.”

Whatever. Demarest got the point across. His team has a split personality.

The Aztecs have played at times with intensity; they had two 24-hit games in the Garden Grove League this season.

The same Aztecs rallied from a 2-0 seventh-inning deficit Friday to tie Apple Valley and went on to win, 4-2, in 12 innings in the first round of the Southern Section 2-A playoffs.

And then there are the Aztecs who play with little emotion, who lost to Rancho Alamitos twice in the last week of the regular season.

Those are the Aztecs who seemed ready to pack up their equipment bags and their season after they fell behind, 2-0, on a bases-loaded, two-out blooper down the left-field line in the fourth inning Friday.

It didn’t look good for the home team, which had its Nos. 7, 8 and 9 hitters scheduled to bat in the seventh. But Guillermo Alcanter singled on an 0-2 pitch, Mike Wilson walked and John Park bunted both runners over.

Tim Park’s ground out scored one run, and Jeff Wood lofted a soft fly ball to center field that fell in to tie the score, 2-2.

“You could see the excitement in our players, coaches and fans after that hit,” Demarest said. “Everyone was in a lull, but when Jeff got the hit, it was like we got a second chance.”

Mike Wilson gave the Aztecs a chance to win by pitching eight innings of shutout relief, and La Quinta (22-4) finally broke through in the 12th as Wood drew a two-out walk and Jeff Kronfly hit a home run to right field for the victory.

“Hopefully, this win will give us a lift,” Demarest said.

The Aztecs should be in a good emotional frame of mind when they travel to Indio for Tuesday’s second-round game, but their bats still are not in perfect health. La Quinta had only seven hits in 12 innings against Apple Valley.

Friday’s victory was similar to many of La Quinta’s early-season victories, when the Aztecs won with pitching, defense and luck. Their first two league victories were by 2-1 and 1-0 scores.

Then the Aztecs went on an offensive tear. They had 24 hits and scored 14 runs against Los Amigos on April 1. The next week, they beat Garden Grove twice by 9-0 scores.

On April 22, La Quinta had 24 hits and 21 runs in a game against Bolsa Grande. Three games later, on May 1, the Aztecs clinched the league championship with four games remaining.

That’s when the problems began.

“The kids felt they were giving 100%, which they were, but they just weren’t playing with emotion after we clinched the league,” Demarest said. “And emotion is what carried us through our season. Once that stopped, we became an average team.”

La Quinta struggled to 5-2 and 8-7 victories over last-place Los Amigos to improve to 13-0 in league but closed the season with 4-2 and 6-2 losses to Rancho Alamitos. La Quinta had four hits in the first game against the Vaqueros and three in the second.

“Everyone is going to go through a lull during the season, and we did after we won league,” Demarest said. “But you have to give some credit to Rancho--they just wanted the games more than we did, and they played well.”

Say What? It seemed a bold statement at the time, but Bill Gibbons, Ocean View baseball coach, apparently knew what he was talking about.

As Gibbons was looking at the pairings for the 4-A tournament last week, he said, “Orange County is where the power is. Generally speaking, the competition here is better than it is anywhere else. If I was from out of this area, I would not want to play an Orange County team.”

County teams, at least in the 4-A division, made Gibbons look good Friday. Of the seven county teams in the 4-A playoffs, six won first-round games to advance to Tuesday’s second round.

Mater Dei, which finished third in the Angelus League, defeated Bay League champion Palos Verdes, 7-3. The county’s other third-place team, Edison of the Sunset League, gave Marmonte League champion Simi Valley all it could handle before losing, 7-6.

The county’s three second-place teams--El Dorado (Empire League), Westminster (Sunset) and Servite (Angelus)--all advanced, as El Dorado whipped Culver City, 13-2, Westminster shut out Muir, 8-0, and Servite edged Notre Dame, 1-0.

League champions Esperanza (Empire) and Ocean View (Sunset) also advanced, as defending 4-A champion Esperanza beat Riverside Poly, 9-6, and Ocean View pitchers Dan Naulty and Mike Fyhrie combined to no-hit Channel Islands, 3-0.

“That little axiom has some validity,” Gibbons said. “I really believe it.”

County teams will have another chance to test Gibbons Tuesday. All six 4-A teams will play out-of-county teams in the second round, as Esperanza plays host to Diamond Bar, Servite travels to Westlake, Ocean View plays host to Colton, Westminster travels to Lakewood, Mater Dei travels to Crespi and El Dorado plays host to Simi Valley.

The Westminster-Lakewood game is a rematch of last season’s second-round game, won by Lakewood, 4-3, when the Lancers scored four runs in the seventh.

Another rematch will highlight 2-A action, when Tustin travels to second-seeded Capistrano Valley.

“We were 9-0 last year when they handed us our first defeat,” said Vince Brown, Tustin coach. “We have a lot of kids back from that team who are glad we’ll be playing them.”

Tustin was fortunate to even have another shot at Capistrano Valley. The Tillers scored five runs with the help of three walks, a balk and an error in the bottom of the seventh Friday to defeat Bolsa Grande, 7-6.

The tying and winning runs scored on an error. The Tillers will need more than luck to defeat the Cougars, who are favored to win the title now that top-seeded Saugus has been eliminated.

Prep Notes

Brea-Olinda’s 7-4 victory over Cerritos in the first round of the 3-A playoffs Friday was the Wildcats’ first playoff victory since 1982, when Brea defeated Nogales in the first round. The Wildcats, who play third-seeded John W. North Tuesday, had not reached the playoffs in the last five years. . . . The Santa Ana basketball team will sponsor a benefit dance June 5 at Happy Daze Night Club in Irvine. Proceeds from the dance, which begins at 7 p.m., will help send the Saints to Washington, D.C. and New York City, where they will play several games this August. Tickets are $5 and will include admission, dancing and a buffet. Tickets can be purchased by calling Cynthia Cady at 558-5811 or Santa Ana Coach Greg Coombs at 558-5780. . . . Cypress softball pitcher Nicky Luce has signed a national letter of intent to attend Cal Poly Pomona. . . . Russ Bolinger, a former Ram lineman, will be the guest speaker for the Orange County All-Star football game’s kickoff dinner at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Santa Ana Elks Club. The 28th all-star game is scheduled for July 17 in Orange Coast College’s LeBard Stadium. . . . The spring meeting of the Orange County Athletic Directors’ Assn. is 7 p.m. Wednesday in the Anaheim Stadium Club. Guest speaker is Tom Tutko, a San Jose State professor of psychology. The county’s athletes of the year will be announced at the meeting. . . . Pepperdine basketball Coach Jim Harrick will the guest speaker at the Orange County all-star tipoff dinner at 6:30 p.m. June 15 at the Costa Mesa Community Center. Coaches and players from the boys’ and girls’ teams will be honored at the dinner, which is open to the public. Tickets, priced at $12, can be reserved by calling 642-1603. . . . The Sunset League all-star baseball team will meet the Moore League all-stars at Blair Field in Long Beach at 7 p.m. June 10.