Kennedy Shakes Its Losing Streak, Finds Right Ingredients Against Taft

A Shakey’s outing led to consecutive shaky outings. The home of pizza and mojo potatoes put the mojo on Kennedy High twice last week, it seems.

Perhaps the Golden Cougar baseball team--which selected the pizza parlor as the site of its weekly get-together last Monday night--should have known something was amiss when catcher David Bourne’s truck started smoking because of an electrical problem in the parking lot.

The team fire--after a 5-0 start--was put out by El Camino Real, which cruised to a pair of lopsided victories last week over Kennedy.

“Pizza was a bad idea,” Bourne said, laughing. “Shakey’s will have to do without our business from now on.”

It was business as usual for Kennedy on Tuesday, though. The Golden Cougars banged out six extra-base hits and defeated Taft, 8-2, in a Northwest Valley Conference game at Taft.

The team outing this week? An excursion to a school volleyball match. Despite an early two-run deficit at the hands of Taft, matters on Tuesday went more along the lines of bump , set and spike .

With Kennedy (6-2, 1-2 in league play) trailing, 2-0, in the fourth, cleanup hitter Rick Nadeau belted a two-run home run over the fence in right-center to wake up the comatose Kennedy offense, which had not scored in 14 innings.

Bourne, who bats fifth, and third-place hitter Jeff Tagliaferri also awoke at the plate. The senior trio, who accounted for half of Kennedy’s 12 hits and scored five runs, all are third-year lettermen.

“The 3-4-5 guys are the basic structure of the team,” said Nadeau, who drove in three runs. “If we don’t do it . . . “

They definitely did it against Taft, which helped by committing four errors. Tagliaferri hit a two-run homer in the fifth, his third, to help stake Kennedy to a 6-2 lead. Bourne had three hits.

Kennedy right-hander Miguel Diaz (3-1) surrendered a pair of runs in the first on a single by Mike Ferguson before settling down.

Taft (6-2, 1-2) managed three hits over the final six innings and blew its best chance to get back into the game in the fifth. With two out, the bases loaded and Kennedy holding a 6-2 lead, Gabe Kapler was picked off second base by Diaz, who struck out three, walked two and hit four batters. Diaz allowed five singles.

Taft right-hander Warren Stewart (1-1) yielded six runs, three earned, in 4 1/3 innings. The defense didn’t help, committing three errors during Kennedy’s three-run fifth.