Canyon Comeback Falls Short in 10-7 Loss to Ventura

The easy thing to say after Canyon High School lost to Ventura, 10-7, Friday in a Southern Section 4-A quarterfinal was that the Comanches lost because John Cummings didn’t pitch.

Cummings, Canyon’s left-handed ace, pitched complete games in the team’s first two playoff games. He had a 9-3 record and also 115 strikeouts, tops among Orange County pitchers this season.

However, Hi Lavalle, Canyon’s coach, decided before Friday’s game to rest Cummings and inserted him at designated hitter.

“I would have been endangering him by trying to pitch him today,” Lavalle said.

Instead, Scott Myers started and bore the brunt of Ventura’s 13-hit attack. In the end, Lavalle said, it was Ventura’s hot-hitting lineup that helped the Cougars advance to the semifinals next Tuesday.

Ventura (21-6-1) advances to play South Hills, a 16-6 winner over Hueneme. Canyon ends its season 19-9.

“I would have liked to have matched (Cummings) against them today,” Lavalle said. “(But) they are a good hitting team. I imagine they hit a lot of people well.”

Two singles and two errors by Canyon gave Ventura, which has been averaging 9 runs and 11 hits this season, a quick 1-0 lead. In the second, Kurt Mahler’s sacrifice fly knocked in one run and David Lewis’ two-out single scored two more to make the score, 4-0.

Then Lawrence Cottrell led off with a home run to left field, extending the lead to 5-0.

Myers lasted only until the fifth, when Joe Furukawa replaced him. Canyon, having scored a run without getting a hit in the third, trailed, 8-1, at that point.

Furukawa fared only slightly better than Myers. Ventura’s David Eggert scored the first run on a single to left-center. Steve Dailey followed with a sacrifice fly to left that scored Harvey Jones, and it was 10-1.

“We’ve been pretty offensive lately,” Ventura Coach Dan Smith said, meaning that in a good sense.

Canyon got only five hits off Dean McMillin (7-4) and though it scored two more runs in the fifth to make it closer, appeared as if it would go meekly in the seventh.

However, after Tom Furukawa struck out to start the inning, the Comanches almost made a remarkable comeback.

Ralph Pacheco, the next batter, singled and went to second on a wild pitch. Dan Puskas reached on a fielding error by shortstop Mike Tafoya, Pacheco advancing to second. Puskas stole second without a throw.

Then, Joe Furukawa and Cummings hit back-to-back singles to score Pacheco and Puskas, and suddenly the gap was only 10-5.

Smith replaced McMillin with Cottrell, who got Chris Rodwick to fly to center. But Joe Furukawa tagged to score from third to make it, 10-6.

Myers, the next batter, reached on what should have been the third out. He hit a little blooper over second base that B.J. Barron couldn’t handle.

John Thibert followed with another blooper that went over Cottrell’s head. Barron was playing too deep to catch it or throw Thibert out and Cottrell’s follow-through took him out of the play.

The hit scored Cummings and, with two runners on base, Mike Williams came to the plate representing the tying run.

“Coach came out and said he was going to take me out,” Cottrell said. “But I said, ‘No, I can get him.’ ”

Smith left Cottrell in, and the pitcher struck out Williams to end the game.