Foothill gets best of C.V. in rout

Spraying the ball around the diamond and cashing in on errors did a lot of good, to say the least, for the 9- and 10-year-old Foothill All-Stars softball team, which earned a 17-7 victory against Crescenta Valley in an elimination game of the Tri-Cities Little League District 16 All-Star Tournament on Wednesday night at Montrose Park.

“When you can hit, things will happen,” Foothill co-manager Todd Fabian said. “As much as you can, you want to try and put the pressure on the other team.”

The game was called in the bottom of the fifth inning because of the 10-run mercy rule.

Foothill took advantage of 14 Crescenta Valley errors to put itself in the championship game against Tujunga at 5 p.m. Monday at Montrose Park. An if-necessary championship game would be held at a time to be determined Tuesday at the same location.

Everything worked out well for Foothill, which suffered a 13-5 loss to Tujunga on Monday. Ten of Crescenta Valley’s errors led to Foothill scoring runs.

Crescenta Valley nearly erased an 8-1 deficit, as it scored six runs in the top of the fourth. However, Crescenta Valley’s defense gave it all back in the bottom of the inning to help Foothill take a 14-7 lead.

“I got a little nervous when it got to 8-7,” Fabian said. “It’s huge to get those six runs back.”

Crescenta Valley Manager Cary McReynolds said defensive struggles plagued his team throughout the tournament.

“We had lots of defensive problems,” McReynolds said. “We had a lot of players playing out of position.

“We were scoring the runs, but we didn’t do enough on defense.”

Foothill grabbed a 5-0 lead in the second with a run-scoring hit by Alley Johnson and a fielder’s choice by Rebecca Legapsi.

Foothill closed out the win on a two-run single by Miranda Diaz in the fifth.

Crescenta Valley received run-scoring hits in the fourth from Clair O’Connor and Teagan Borgeson-Lecke.

Fabian said Foothill will have to do similar things it did against Crescenta Valley to topple Tujunga twice.

“They hit, but we’ve got to hit back,” Fabian said.