Ohlone Baseball To Face Butte In CCCAA Playoffs

The impressive Ohlone College baseball team will open a best-of-three game series against visiting Butte at 3 p.m. on Friday to begin the CCCAA Northern California Regional Playoffs.

Game 2 will be at noon on Saturday, with a third game to follow at 3 p.m., if necessary.

The fifth-seeded Renegades (32-8), ranked No. 22 in the Perfect Game Juco College Top 25, put the final touches on a third consecutive Coast Pacific title last week, taking two of three against Monterey Peninsula to complete a 15-3 Pacific mark.

After sailing to the conference title, in fact clinching with three games remaining for the third straight year, Ohlone will be thrust into a matchup pitting two 30-win teams -- the only one of its kind in the North bracket. Butte (30-9) is riding a four-game winning streak.

Ohlone beat Monterey 8-0 on April 26 in the regular season home finale for an outstanding sophomore cast.

In a 9-0 win over Monterey on April 24, Tyler Stultz allowed just three hits over seven innings with nine strikeouts.

Renegades coach Mike Curran is pleased with how the team managed to stay sharp last week, despite not having much to play for.

"We were really, really trying to keep the guys motivated and we found a way to win two of three from Monterey Peninsula, a good team which is in the playoffs," Curran said proudly.

Curran described his hitters as "locked in" and says pitchers are pounding the strike zone and keeping the ball down.

Butte, the runner-up in the Golden Valley Conference and seeded 12/11 in the playoffs, features top pitcher Ben Elder (11-3, 2.74 ERA), who is tied for first in the state in wins and has 93 strikeouts. He is backed up by Austin McFarlane (8-2, 2.90 ERA, 78 K). Butte is always well coached by Anthony Ferro and his staff, and Curran expects a tough battle.

Ohlone’s Andrew Amato (8-2, 3.13) and Stultz (8-1, 2.45) are tied for second in the conference in wins with eight apiece, a win ahead of Ryan Robinson and Peter Van Loon. Robinson leads the conference in earned run average at 1.93 and Van Loon is third at 2.20.

Ohlone slugger Zach Patterson is tied for first in the state in home runs with 12 and is tied for fourth in batting average at .416.

Impressively, Patterson, who also has 47 RBIs, won the triple crown in the conference. He also finished tied for second in saves with four.

Of course, the Renegades have lots of firepower. Four players finished in the top five in RBIs in the conference, also including Dalton Vanhille (46), Michael Gallagher (40) and Justin Clark (36). Brett Tressen was fourth in home runs with five.

In Ohlone’s 9-0 win over Monterey, Patterson and Gallagher each had two hits and an RBI and Vanhille and Norman Leon both scored twice and had hits.

In the 8-0 win, Patterson was 2 for 4 with a home run, double, and three runs scored. Tressen and Gallagher had doubles. Luke O’Brien walked twice and had two RBIs.

LOOKING UP: Former Ohlone pitcher Stirling Strong ('17, '18) is pitching well at Point Loma University. As of April 24, Strong was tied for the most pitching starts for the Sea Lions (11) and was 4-2 with a 3.45 ERA in 62 innings.