EMPIRE LEAGUE BASEBALL ROUNDUP : Top-Ranked Esperanza Falls to El Dorado

Two days after bungling a chance at knocking off Orange County’s No. 1-ranked high school baseball team, second-ranked El Dorado finally got it right with a 2-0 Empire League victory over top-rated Esperanza.

El Dorado cleaned up its act Friday in Placentia, putting Wednesday’s four-error loss to Esperanza out of mind.

This time--the teams’ fourth and final scheduled meeting this season--El Dorado’s Brett Tomko pitched a four-hitter and his teammates provided timely hitting to give Esperanza only its second loss this season.

The victory moved El Dorado (13-4, 6-1) into sole possession of first place in the Empire League. It was the first time Esperanza (15-2, 5-2) had been shut out since the 1989 season.

“I was not very happy Wednesday,” El Dorado Coach Steve Gullotti said. “I was disappointed in our mental approach. We had the No. 1 team in Orange County and we came out flat. We should have been up. And we were just the opposite.”

El Dorado had no such problems Friday.

Esperanza’s Joe Foss retired El Dorado in order until hitting Chris Barlow with a pitch to lead off the fourth inning. John Street sacrificed Barlow to second, and Brian Loyd grounded to first, moving Barlow to third.

Foss then walked Tyson Dowdell, bringing up Tomko, who singled to center to score Barlow.

An inning later, El Dorado scored its second run in similar fashion. A single, a sacrifice, a groundout and a ground rule double by Barlow scored Gar Vallone from third for a 2-0 El Dorado lead.

“I knew we weren’t going to score a lot of runs,” Gullotti said. “So we had to scratch something together.”

It turned out to be the difference in a pitchers’ duel between Tomko (3-0) and Foss (4-1). El Dorado managed to make a minor breakthrough against Foss--two runs. Esperanza couldn’t make a dent against Tomko.

“You don’t score, you’re not going to win,” Esperanza Coach Mike Curran said. “We didn’t hit any balls hard.”

Curran could not fault Foss’ pitching, though. Foss gave up four hits before giving way to reliever Jeff Bowman in the sixth.

“He didn’t deserve to lose,” Curran said of Foss.

Cypress 11, Los Alamitos 6--Pitcher Micah Stovall hit a two-run home run in the third inning and Danny Flanagan hit a two-run homer in the fourth for host Cypress. Stovall (2-2) pitched 5 1/3 innings, striking out four, for Cypress.