PREP BASEBALL : Montgomery Drops Ball 5 Times, Falls to Lancers, 6-2

Bishop Montgomery figured Thursday night would be a good time to reassert itself in Angelus League baseball.

The Knights were at home against Bishop Amat, were rested from a week off and were looking ahead to a bye in league play later this week.

Instead, it was Bishop Amat that jumped back into league contention with a 6-2 victory over Bishop Montgomery at Torrance Park. The Lancers took advantage of five Bishop Montgomery errors and five Knight pitchers to improve to 1-2 in league and 6-8 overall. The Knights fell to 1-3 and 11-4-1.

“I’m disappointed because for the second game in a row our defense just absolutely collapsed,” said Bishop Montgomery Coach Bob Anderson. “We’ve committed 11 errors in the last two games after committing just 15 in our 14 previous games.”

The Knights scored in the first when Curtis Bowman and Dudley Callahan drew walks and advanced on a wild pitch. Erik Russell’s sacrifice fly scored Bowman and Pat Sprengel’s bunt plated Callahan.

They maintained the advantage until the third when Bishop Amat sent 11 men to the plate and scored five runs on four hits and two errors.

Gerardo Mota got aboard on shortstop Bowman’s error, went to second on Andy Branch’s wild pitch and scored on Juan Hernandez’s double. Brian Harmon reached on an error and Hernandez went to third.

Second baseman Don Batty bobbled a double-play ball, allowing Hernandez to score, and Hector Rodriguez tripled in two runs to give Bishop Amat a lead it would not relinquish.

Branch (3-2) suffered the loss while J. D. Romero (1-0) earned the victory in relief of Robert Stewart.

“I was fairly pleased with the pitching,” Anderson said. “It was just a matter of making a couple of key errors and their getting key hits.”

Bishop Montgomery had just four hits while Bishop Amat banged out eight, led by Rodriguez who had three hits and a sacrifice fly for three RBIs.

Leuzinger 7, Rolling Hills 3--After spotting Rolling Hills a 3-0 lead through two innings, the Olympians took advantage of Titan errors and timely hits to post a Bay League victory at Rolling Hills.

Leuzinger loaded the bases with two outs in the third with the help of two infield errors. That set the stage for Tyrone Scott, who cleared the bases on a triple to right-center, tying the score.

The Olympians benefited from an outfield error in the fourth inning when they took the lead for good, 5-3, on run-scoring singles by Armando Rodriguez and Earl Cole. Sophomore Marvin Johnson hit a solo homer in the seventh.

Leuzinger evened its league record at 2-2 and improved to 9-5-1 overall, while Rolling Hills fell to 3-1 and 7-6.

“We got fatheaded,” said Titan Coach Garry Poe, whose team finished with four errors and four hits.

Santa Monica 15, Palos Verdes 4--The Vikings scored 13 runs and sent 17 batters to the plate in the sixth inning to break up a close game and send Palos Verdes to an embarrassing Bay League defeat at Santa Monica.

Leading 3-2, the Sea Kings self-destructed in the sixth as Santa Monica turned six hits, three errors, four walks and a hit batsman into its biggest inning of the season.

Hawthorne 8, Torrance 3--The Cougars jumped into a first-place tie with Rolling Hills in the Bay League with an easy win at Torrance Park. Hawthorne improved to 3-1 in league play and 7-5 overall, while the struggling Tartars dropped to 1-3 and 2-9.