PREP BASEBALL : Oak Park May Try to Steal Title

Kevin Van Duyn of Cerritos Valley Christian High won’t be the first baseball coach to worry about Agoura Oak Park this season. But he may be the last.

Valley Christian and Oak Park meet this afternoon for the CIF Southern Section Division 1-A championship at Cal State Fullerton and Van Duyn hopes to end the season in the same fashion that got him to the final: keep the opposition off base.

Oak Park (16-9) is a team to keep off base. It’s not easy to do and when the Eagles do get on base, stolen bases follow. Oak Park has 105 stolen bases in 25 games.

Senior Eric Pryor, who is hitting .449 and has a team-high 24 runs batted in, has 21 stolen bases and junior Damin Sterling is hitting .437 with 21 RBIs and 18 stolen bases.

Despite all that, Jeff Gibbons’ pitching performances have been good enough to label Oak Park a one-man team. Gibbons has an 11-1 record with a 1.43 earned-run average. He can pitch only five innings under Section limits.

Valley Christian (19-4-1) can make opposing coaches sweat, too. Brett Davis and Brett De Bie each batted over .400 and starter Brooks Morris is 4-1 with a 2.77 ERA.

Prep Notes

Riverside Bethel Christian (24-3) will play Pasadena Poly (20-3) in the Small Schools game at 7:30 p.m. The 1-A game was switched to 4:30 p.m. because Valley Christian’s prom is tonight.