Woodland Hills East Draws an Ace : American Legion baseball: Left-hander Siegel joins pitching staff in time for Area playoffs.

Woodland Hills East managed to scrape its way through the District 20 playoffs with paper-thin pitching. Now, just in time for the double-elimination Area 6 playoffs, help has arrived in the form of Justin Siegel.

Siegel, a left-hander who signed with North Carolina State last November but missed the Taft High regular season while recovering from elbow surgery, has joined Woodland Hills East now that his Palomino team has been eliminated from postseason play.

“I think he’ll certainly add some depth to our staff and take some of the pressure off the other guys,” said Woodland Hills East co-Coach Mike Clouser, whose team finished second in the District 20 playoffs.

Siegel was 7-3 with a 3.00 earned-run average his junior year at Taft. He likely will join a starting rotation that is led by right-hander Brandon Witkow (4-2, 2.52 in Legion play). Witkow is scheduled to pitch in today’s 10 a.m. Area 6 opener against Beverly Hills (15-2) at UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium.

In today’s other opening-round games, District 20 champion Woodland Hills West (23-4) will meet District 16 champion Ventura (18-5) at 6 p.m., and Claremont (35-9-2) will meet Westchester (19-3) at 2 p.m.

The winner of the double-elimination tournament that concludes Sunday advances to the state tournament Aug. 7-10 in Yountville.

Siegel has been on the Woodland Hills East roster all season but had some reservations about playing.

“They asked me to play with them because they needed pitching and I said I’d love to as long as it doesn’t cause a problem,” Siegel said. “At this stage of the tournament, the only thing they care about is winning.”

Beverly Hills will start left-hander Chris Kelly (5-0), who is headed for Cal State Bakersfield, against Woodland Hills East (18-9). Beverly Hills also has catcher Jeremy Booth, one of four players selected to represent District 24 in next week’s North-South all-star game.

City Section 4-A Division player of the year Randy Wolf (6-1) will start for Woodland Hills West against Brandon Knight, a Times All-Ventura County right-hander from Buena High who was drafted by the Colorado Rockies.

Knight’s .490 average leads a Ventura offense that includes right fielder Chad Anderson (.434), second baseman-catcher Monty Moritz (.415), catcher John McNamara (.438) and Fresno State-bound left fielder Gary Paul (.346).

Claremont, which played 19 games during a three-week tour through Canada and the northern United States, won its sixth consecutive District 18 title.

Claremont has pitchers Matt Wise (11-0, 0.95), who was drafted by the Seattle Mariners and signed to play at Pepperdine, and Greg Shepard (8-0, 3.11). The top hitters are center fielder Justin Long (.500, six home runs, 40 runs batted in, 29 stolen bases), right fielder Jeff Simpson (.447, 53 RBIs) and first baseman Chris Hirz-Simonson (eight homers, 41 RBIs).

Westchester, which was 16-0 in District 24, is led by right-hander Robby Green (5-1, 1.24), an All-Mission League selection at Loyola High last spring.