Jul 6, 2008

Redwood City stars score 21 in opener

Mistakes costly for Palo Alto

By Amir Modirzadeh / Daily News Correspondent

Palo Alto might wonder if it played at Full Moon High School rather than Half Moon Bay High after a series of early miscues led to a 21-11 loss to Redwood City National on Saturday in the first game of the Little League District 52 13-and-14-year-old All-Stars Tournament.

Despite being designated the home team, Palo Alto looked a little uncomfortable in the field as it tried to adjust to an artificial surface and the weather conditions. Redwood City National wasn't about to give its opponents a chance to settle in, taking advantage of four Palo Alto errors in the first two innings to jump to an early 8-0 lead.

"It was a concurrence of unfortunate [circumstances]," said Jeff Simons, acting manager of Palo Alto. "There was the fog, the rubber field, the tight strike zone, and the other team had a lot of really good hitters."

Palo Alto had an opportunity to get back into the game in the bottom of the second. An error and four walks allowed by Redwood City National let Palo Alto score two runs without recording a base hit. However, Nicholas Gasparini came in to pitch in relief and struck out his first batter, then induced a harmless pop-up and a groundout to leave the bases loaded and end the Palo Alto rally. Gasparini's pitching and Palo Alto's inability to break through with a big inning proved to be the turning point in the game as Redwood City scored seven more runs in the top of the third to put the game out of reach at 15-2.

"We swung the bats pretty well," Redwood City National manager Mark Satterlee said. "As a coach, you love watching the middle of your order hit line drives."

Redwood City National finished the game with 16 hits, including back-to-back-to-back triples in the second inning by 3-4-5 hitters Brian Clifford, Garrett Coe and Anthony Hillerby.

Palo Alto was able to trim the deficit to eight at 15-7 by staying patient at the plate and taking advantage of more control problems by Redwood City National's pitchers. The All-Star team, consisting of players from the three Junior-level Little League teams in Palo Alto, also settled down in the field and limited Redwood City National to six runs over the final three innings.

The late runs and improved defense allowed Palo Alto to leave the park with a positive outlook heading into their game today against Half Moon Bay, which beat Redwood City American 16-6 in Saturday's other first-round game.

"I think we were all just a little nervous at the beginning of the game," Palo Alto right fielder Scott Ziebelman said. "[Playing better late in the game] is definitely going to help us tomorrow. We are probably going to be a lot more relaxed, and hopefully we'll get a win."