Barstow one more game to make season goals

BARSTOW- With Monday’s 7-5 victory over Victor Valley the Barstow High School baseball team has their season checklist out going into Wednesday Night’s finale.

Check one: complete the sweep of Victor Valley, check two: win 15 games in a season, check three: win the Desert Sky League.

“Our philosophy has been to pick each other up, and today we collected and we were able to get the job done,” coach Sean Sers said. “We’ve been up and down. We’ve been doing the small things right.”

Shortstop Aaron Sanchez helped position the Aztecs for just that with his fourth inning blast giving them a 7-4 lead and driving in Freezy Smalls. 

“I was struggling with getting a hit. I was 0-for-2 during the game, and I just wanted to get that over with, and I was looking for a good pitch to drive,” Sanchez said. “I didn’t want to start a slump in the game, and I saw a fastball and I just took advantage of the pitch.”

Barstow, who has secured the No. 1 seed in the Desert Sky League CIF division playoffs, began the game with an RBI double by Andrew Meas scoring Mark Alverez in the first inning. 

The Aztecs did even further damage in the second giving them a three run cushion when Jacob Muir’s basehit scored Chris Madero and Micheal Moorman giving them a 3-0 lead at the conclusion of the second inning.

Alex Pollard tied things up in the third with a homerun over tieing the game. Moreman’s drove in Adrian Harrison to make the game 4-3 in the third.

Sanchez’s three run blast finish gave them a 7-4 cushion at the conclusion of the fourth. 

By the fifth inning, pitcher Freezy Smalls began to show signs of fatigue allowing one more run to cross. Smalls was replaced by Sanchez, who ended up striking out the side in the sixth to give them the win.

“We stressed defense in the seventh inning,” Sers said. “We are going to have to play a little better than that. “Although, we have the No.1 seed (in the playoffs) we still want to maintain our momentum going into the playoffs.

Muir led the team with a 2-RBI game, and Sanchez a 2 RBI performance with three
strikeouts.

“I really felt the weight on my shoulders to come in and relieve Freezy so we could accomplish what we set out to do,” Sanchez said. 

According to Sers, although they have secured the No. 1 seed because they won the series against Granite Hills, it doesn’t mean as much with a victory in the season finale against Victor Valley.

“Aaron and Jacob really stepped it up today,” Sers said. “We need to continue to have players step up like that as we go on the season. “We want to win the DSL for pride and to accomplish our season’s goals.”

(760) 256-4122 or jason_blasco@link.freedom.com