Villers Dominant; Dicochea, Lagattuta and Blake Homer in Healdsburg Playoff Win

July 24, 2019

Healdsburg, CA

Ian Villers (Cal) was nearly perfect through five innings, allowing only one walk, and Jason Dicochea (Santa Clara), John Lagattuta (Cal) and Cam Blake (Texas A&M) each hit solo home runs to lead the Healdsburg Prune Packers to a 7-0 shutout win over the Lincoln Potters in the first game of the three-game CCL Affiliates Division championship series tonight at Recreation Park. Villers struck out eight in his outing and retired every batter he faced in order until he walked Tanner O’Tremba (Texas Tech) on four pitches with two outs in his last inning, presumably the last batter he would have faced. Villers then retired the next batter he faced to complete his hitless start. By the time Villers’ outing was complete the Packers had amassed a 4-0 lead, having scored three times in the second inning when Connor Mack (Cal) hit an RBI-double and Joe Lampe (UC Davis) hit a two-run single, and once in the third when Dicochea hit his home run. Lagattuta hit his home run in the bottom of the fifth which gave Andrew Hansen (St. Mary’s), who relieved Villers to start the sixth inning, a five-run cushion to work with. He needed none of it. Hansen picked up where Villers left off and shutout the Potters over the last four innings, allowing two singles and one walk while striking out three. Brain Martinez (Cal St East Way) started on the mound for Lincoln and suffered the loss, allowing four runs on five hits while striking out two over four innings. Travis Parker (Utah Valley) pitched the fifth and sixth innings, allowing a run in each when Lagattuta hit his home run in the fifth and Blake hit his in the sixth. Michael Potter (Cal St Monterey Bay) finished the game for the Potters, allowing four hits over two innings and surrendering the last Packers run in the eighth when Bryan Sturges (UT San Antonio) and Blake hit consecutive singles to leadoff the inning and Sturges scored on a first-and-third rundown situation when Blake was picked off first base but stayed in the rundown long enough for Sturges to score. The two teams will meet tomorrow at 4pm and, if necessary, again at 7pm, to determine the CCL Affiliates champion.

Click here for the boxscore of this game

The CCL Playoffs get underway tomorrow at Sparky Anderson Field on the campus of Cal Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks with a three-team single elimination tournament. Tomorrow the No. 3 seeded Arroyo Seco Saints will meet the No. 2 seeded Orange County Riptide in an elimination game, the winner of which will meet the No. 1 seeded Santa Barbara Foresters on Friday in a winner-take-all championship game. Game times are 4:30pm. The winner of the Affiliate Division Playoffs will meet the CCL Champion in a best-of-three California State Championship set to begin Saturday at Sparky Anderson Field at 12pm.