Michael Knocks In Six Runs, Simi Valley Knocks Out Agoura

And the beatings go on for the Simi Valley High baseball team.

The Pioneers, with their take-no-prisoners attack, felled another Marmonte League foe Friday as three players hit home runs to pace a 13-hit attack in a 17-6 victory over host Agoura.

Simi Valley (10-1, 6-0 in league play) has outscored league opponents, 95-16. And Pioneer batting averages continue to soar like shots off the bat of designated hitter Jeff Michael.

Michael, a sophomore who joined the varsity at the start of league play, drove in six runs Friday with a bases-loaded double in the fifth and a three-run home run in the sixth. The home run was Michael’s second, and he has 15 runs batted in.

Senior Jason Alcala, the No. 9 hitter, hit a three-run home run in the fifth, and senior Britten Pond added a solo homer in the sixth.

Simi Valley sparred with the last-place Chargers (3-10, 0-4) for four innings, building a 2-1 advantage before delivering knockout blows with a seven-run fifth and seven-run sixth.

Senior right-hander Bill Treadway (2-0) yielded only one run before exiting after four innings and 60 pitches.

Treadway will start Monday, when Simi Valley plays Okmulgee (Okla.) at Placentia El Dorado High in the opening round of the Upper Deck tournament.

“We’ve scored seven runs in an inning a bunch of times this year,” Simi Valley Coach Mike Scyphers said. “And we always seem to do it with two outs.”

Agoura senior right-hander Josh Markiewicz (0-2) was touched for two runs in the first inning, then pitched well before the dam broke in the fifth. During one stretch, Markiewicz retired 11 of 13 batters, including the side in order in the second and third. But with two out in the fifth and Aaron Whitley at second, Markiewicz committed a balk, then yielded a single to Kevin Nykoluk.

Before reliever Cary Gallardo entered, six consecutive batters had reached base, and Michael and Alcala had done their damage.

In the seventh, the Pioneers scored five times before an out was recorded.

“We tried to stay real calm and not to get caught up in the Simi Valley hit parade,” Agoura assistant Ed Aguilar said. “And it worked--until the fifth inning.”