Pitching Carries Villa Park Past Encino Crespi for Title

The Villa Park baseball team added an element to its pitching chart Thursday night.

Resilience.

The Spartans sent Mark Trumbo and Alex Curry to the mound with little rest, and both came through with gutsy pitching performances to lead Villa Park to a 2-1 victory over Encino Crespi in the championship game of the El Dorado National Classic baseball tournament at Cal State Fullerton.

Trumbo (8-1) threw 90 pitches over six innings Monday in an 8-4 victory over defending tournament champion Taylorsville (Utah). According to California Interscholastic Federation rules, he was still eligible to record 12 outs this week. He did that against Crespi, facing the minimum number of hitters on 49 pitches.

“I threw a couple pitches in the bullpen and I knew I was on,” said Trumbo, who has signed with USC.

Sophomore right-hander Alex Curry, who threw 56 pitches in five innings Tuesday against Baton Rouge (La.) Parkview Baptist, took over for Trumbo with the Spartans leading, 2-0. He pitched out of trouble in the fifth and sixth innings before retiring the side in order in the seventh.

“I just got the ball over and let them hit it,” he said.

The Spartans (15-1) scored two runs in the first inning without hitting the ball hard off starter Shaunt Bedrosian. Mike Vass led off with a walk, took second on a passed ball and third on a balk. He then scored on Trumbo’s check-swing single. After Mitch Bialosky reached on a slow roller in front of the mound, Casen Burwell knocked in Trumbo with a two-hop single up the middle.

Sean Camacho’s run-scoring single in the fifth cut the lead to 2-1. The Celts (14-3) put their first two runners on base in the sixth, but Curry got Trevor Plouffe to line out to center on the first pitch, struck out cleanup hitter Nick Santoro and retired Tony Fiala on a spectacular play by second baseman Kurt Gottschling to end the inning.