Author: ivbaseball

The Bucs 9th inning rally falls short in the 9th inning as they lose to the Riverside Bulldogs 4-6 for their fist league loss. The Bucs headed into the 9th down by three runs and had the tying run on second but were unable to bring him home.

The Bulldogs jumped out to a 2-0 lead with a bases loaded single by Angel Ortiz off Bucs starter Aaron Bernal, They would add another run in the 4th inning, The Bucs would bring the score to 3-2 when DH Brad Lewis hit a two-run homerun in the 5th off starter Christian Beyer. That is the closest the Bucs would be as the Bulldogs would score one more in the 7th and two in the 8th before holding on in the 9th,

The Bucs and Bulldogs play again at 1 PM on Saturday.

The inland Valley Bucs found the treasure chest in the fourth inning as they capitalized on many walks and hit batters.  The Bucs came out on top scoring a total of 10 runs in the second and third inning combined.

The Bucs reliever Jake Wilkerson came into the game in the third inning shutting down the bombers all the way into the fifth inning.  The player of the game goes to Kory Brown, the transfer to Cal State Fullerton as he had a day at the plate going three for five and driving in a pair of runs.

The Inland Valley Bucs take on the Riverside Bulldogs tomorrow at 5 o clock at Citrus College.

The Inland Valley Pirates lost their home opener Wednesday night 3-4 to the visiting San Diego Force. With the loss, the Pirates record falls to 1-1 overall and 0-1 in league. The losing pitcher for the Pirates was Andre Henson as he allowed the go ahead run in the top of the 7th.

The Force took a 2-0 lead early off of Pirates starter Wyatt Shackleford but the Pirates would come answer in the bottom of the third with two runs of their own. Jake Anderson would hit a two run homerun in this inning to tie the game. In the top of the fourth the Force would take the lead but the Pirates would tie it up again in the bottom of the sixth with a run of their own. Ryan Whithorn would get on after an error by the third baseman and would eventually score to tie the game up again.

The top half of the 7th, the Force would score the go ahead run and that would be all they needed as Force pitcher Justin Coleman would then retire the final seven Pirates to close out the game for the Force.

The Pirates are off Thursday before traveling to Santa Barbara for two non-league games,

The Inland Valley Pirates got their summer started off on a high note, earning the 7-6 win in their first game of the season against the San Diego Waves.

The team took an early jump at the lead, scoring five runs in the second, while the Waves were held scoreless for the first three innings thanks to a strong performance by Pirate’s Khoto Hasegawa on the mound. San Diego was, however, able to take advantage of a pitching change in the fourth, as it went on to score it’s first three runs of the game in the inning. Another run by the Pirates in the third and fifth would put Inland Valley up 7-3 after five.

But the Waves weren’t done yet.

San Diego looked like it might just complete the comeback, scoring three more times in the sixth, but were ultimately, unable to capitalize. Trip Aversa closed out the game for the Pirates, ending any final chances the Waves had at taking the lead.

The Pirates are back in action again tomorrow when they take on the San Diego Force at 7:00pm at Amerige Park.

Monte Montenegro got a walk off single to score Seamus Fallon from second base to give the Buccaneers the 3-2 win over the visiting San Diego Waves. With the win, the Bucs improve to 1-1 on the young season.

Before the 9th inning walk-off single, the Bucs were cruising to a 2-1 lead until the 8th when Waves Jacob Stiffin hit a solo home run at the top half the inning to tie the game at 2-2. Before this homerun, the Bucs pitching staff held the Waves to only 3 hits. This would be the last hit they got as the Bucs pitching staff would allow as they would work around an 8th inning walk to silence the Waves

The Buccaneers have the day off Wednesday but start up league play on Thursday at 5 PM against the visiting So Cal Bombers at Citrus College.

The Bucs had their home opener on Monday against the Cal Blue jays as it was a high scoring game for the blue jays.

The Cal Blue Jays took the season opener by scoring 11 against the Inland Valley Bucs as they only scored three. The Bucs had a rocky home opener start as they went through eight different pitchers with the home opener. Starting pitcher Tyler Agajanian only lasted one inning as he had given up a total of four runs.

This is the second straight home opener that the Bluejays have won against the Bucs.

The Bucs hit the road to Amerige Park in Fullerton tomorrow as they take on the San Diego Wave in a non-league game.

The Inland Valley Pirates beat the Solana Beach Cardinals Thursday morning 5-1 but fall to the Ventura County Pirates 6-4 in the semifinals to end the season.

In the first elimination game against the #1 seed Solana Beach Cardinals, the Pirates jumped to an early 1-0 lead in the third inning when Allan Dong scored on a balk by Solana Beach pitcher Jay Crusemire. The Pirates then added on to their lead in the fifth inning. After Jake Taylor singled Allan Dong in to make it 2-0 Inland Valley, Nic Hernandez came up with runners on 2nd and 3rd. He then deposited the ball over the left field fence for his second homerun of the season to make the game 5-0.

Cade Kirkemo got the win for Inland Valley after starting the game and going six scoreless innings. All together, the Inland Valley pitching staff held the #1 seed to one run and six hits to eliminate the Cardinals

After the Inland Valley Pirates beat the Solana Beach Cardinals, they had to wait to see who they would play in the semifinal game. In the middle game of the day, the OC Surf beat the Ventura County Pirates to set up another game between the two Pirates teams. Ventura County beat Inland Valley 6-4 for the second time in two games and ended Inland Valley’s season one game short of the championship.

Ventura County took the early 1-o in the first but Inland Valley put up 3 runs in the third inning on the second homerun of the day by Nic Hernandez. With Inland Valley up 3-1 heading into the bottom of the inning, Ventura County answered back with 2 runs of their own to tie the game up and chase Inland Valley pitcher Michael Gomez out of the game. Grant Ponder then came into the game with the bases loaded and two outs. He promptly struck out Trevor Mulcahey to end Ventura County’s threat.

The score stay tied until the sixth inning when Inland Valley Michael Pineiro led off the inning with a single, Nic Hernandez just missed his third homerun of the day as the ball bounced off the base of the fence for a double. Matt Manskar followed with a sac fly to put up Inland Valley up 4-3. Ventura County answered back again by scoring two runs in the bottom of the inning to make it 4-5 Ventura County.

Inland Valley put up another threat in the top of the 7th. With runners on 2nd and 3rd and one out, Roberto Salinas hit a fly ball to the outfield and Dylan McDowell tagged from third to score what would have been the tying run but Ventura County appealed that McDowell left third base early and won the appeal and end the top of the 7th inning.

Ventura County scored one more run in the 7th to make the game 4-6 and that is how the game would end as Inland Valley went scoreless in the final two innings. With the loss, Inland Valley was eliminated from the playoffs and their season ended on their home field.

The SoCal Collegiate Baseball League announced the all league selections with four Bucs making the second team. Representing the Bucs on the second team were Aaron McCann (Inf), Jordan Hernandez (OF), Hayden Pearce (P), and Sean Patton (P). Aaron McCann led all regulars with a 0.356 average and was tied for the team lead with 13 RBIs. Jordan Hernandez led the Bucs in hits with 27 while batting leadoff for most of the season. Sean Patton led the starting pitching staff with a 1.73 era while pitching the second most innings on the staff. Hayden Pearce had a record of 2-3 while leading the staff with 33 strikeouts.

The Bucs finished 5th in the SoCal Collegiate Baaseball league with a league record of 9-16 and 12-20-1 overall.

League Article

The Inland Valley Pirates finished the season in third place overall and will play the Ventura County Pirates in the first round of playoffs at Cal Poly Pomona on Wednesday at 3:00 PM. The Inland Valley Pirates finished with a league record of 16-9 (18-13-1 Overall) and finished second in the North division of the Sunset League behind the Ventura County Pirates. Ventura County and Inland Valley have played each other five times this season with Ventura County holding the edge 2-3. Below is the playoff schedule

Wednesday July 26^th

• Game 1 – Number 2 Seed VC Pirates (Home) vs Number 3 Seed IV Pirates (Visitors) @ 3:00 pm
• Game 2 – Number 1 Seed Solana Beach Cardinals (Home) vs Number 4 Seed OC Surf (Visitors) @ 7:00 pm

Thursday July 27^th

• Game 3 – Loser of Game 1 vs Loser of Game 2 @ 11:00 am (Loser of this game is eliminated)
• Game 4 – Winner of Game 1 vs Winner of Game 2 @ 3:00 pm (Winner of this game advances to Championship Game)
• Game 5 – Winner of Game 3 vs Loser of Game 4 @ 7:00 pm (Winner of this game advances to Championship Game)
• The Home team or Visiting Team will be determined on Thursday based on who was the Home Team or Visitor the day before.  If both teams playing each other were Home or Visitors the day before, then a coin flip will determine who’s home or away.