Dodgers step up once again

Steve Virgen

For the second straight game, the Costa Mesa National Little League

Dodgers stepped up when they had to. This time it meant a

championship in the Majors division.

The Dodgers, tied, 5-5, through four innings with a scrappy

Phillies squad, scored two runs in each of the final two innings and

won, 9-5, to claim the title Tuesday at TeWinkle Intermediate School.

The Dodgers defeated the Padres, 3-2, in seven innings, Friday to

advance to the championship game. Coleman Brown hit the game-winning

RBI in the bottom of the seventh, scoring A.J. Roth.

“It’s just like we played all year long,” Dodgers Manager Clint

Brown said after his team won Tuesday. “The kids came out and did

exactly what I asked them to do. They put the ball in play, they

played great defense and they just made things happen.”

The Dodgers, the designated visiting team, scored two runs in the

first. Robert Fernandez had the first single for the Dodgers. The hit

came after Mike Markovsky walked. Roth’s groundball resulted in an

infield error and allowed Markovsky and Fernandez to score.

The Phillies, who lost by mercy rule to the Dodgers in the regular

season, answered with four runs in their half of the first,

displaying the moxie they showed throughout their inspiring run in

the double-elimination tournament.

The Phillies, who finished fourth in the regular season and lost

their first game of the tournament, bounced back in the second-chance

bracket, reaching Tuesday’s title game with a 7-3 win over the Padres

Saturday.

The Phillies lost to the Padres to open the tournament, but it was

a different story the second time, when the Phillies broke open the

game with three runs on five hits in the fifth inning. Kyle Prevel,

Joey Eggers, Sho Watanabe, Justin Bosecker, Luke Roberts and Nathan

Alvis contributed timely hits in the victory.

“That’s a good story,” Phillies Manager Sean Patterson said of his

team’s playoff run. “Now it’s time to go the [Tournament of

Champions].”

Both teams advance to the Tournament of Champions, which starts

June 16 at the Seaview Little League fields at LeBard Park in

Huntington Beach.

In the first inning against the Dodgers, Billy di Girolamo,

Stephen Hildebrand, Eggers and Watanabe scored.

The Phillies scored four runs on no hits, getting help from two

Dodger errors. Watanabe scored on a passed ball.

Roth came on in relief in the first with two outs and the bases

loaded and promptly threw three straight strikes. He retired the side

in order in the second and third innings.

In the Dodgers’ third inning, Fernandez came up with the big hit

that helped his team regain the lead. He smacked a two-out, three-run

double, scoring Tony Campo (hit by pitch), Josh Dominguez (single)

and Markovsky (single).

But the Phillies would not go down without a fight.

They tied the game, 5-5, in the fourth.

Kyle Prevel led off the inning with a single to right. He advanced

to second, third and slid home, all on passed balls. Yet with runners

on second and third and two outs, Roth closed the door on the

Phillies with a strikeout.

Roth recorded 10 strikeouts and scattered only two hits in the 5

2/3 innings he pitched. At the plate, Roth also had a double and a

run scored in the sixth inning.

Josh Hill contributed a sacrifice bunt in the fifth to move Benny

Seliner to third base. Seliner was walked and advanced to third on a

passed ball.He scored on McCanne Sanford’s base hit to center field.

Nico Ruan also scored for the Dodgers in the fifth, crossing the

plate on a two-out double by Johnny Valdez, who sent an 0-2 pitch to

the gap in right-center field.

The Dodgers, leading, 9-5, had the bases loaded in the sixth

inning, but Hildebrand, the Phillies pitcher, ended the inning with a

double play. He gloved a low liner and then threw out the runner,

caught too far off first base.

However, Roth allowed just one hit in the final inning to help

give the Dodgers the victory. Prevel had both hits for the Phillies

and was one of three pitchers, including Hildebrand and di Girolamo,

the starter.

“This season, we had a strong defense, but we weren’t as strong

with our bats,” Patterson said. “But we came back in this tournament

and we finished in second place.”