Springing into prep baseball

The end of the winter sports season is just now upon us, but it’s already time for the spring sports to make their debut.

And if it’s time for spring sports, it must be time for the Newport Elks baseball tournament, one of the few tourneys in which all five Newport-Mesa area schools are entered. The action gets underway Friday with a full slate of 27 games in three divisions all across Southern California.

There is, of course, the Sweet Sixteen Division, which includes some of the top programs in the Southland from Mater Dei to Arlington to Esperanza.

What local fans will be more interested in are the Costa Mesa and Foothill Divisions. The former includes Costa Mesa (naturally), Estancia and Sage Hill, while the latter has Newport Harbor and Corona del Mar.

Friday’s opening round of pool play has four games within the Newport-Mesa area. Costa Mesa will play host to Century, Estancia will be at home against Whittier Christian and Sage Hill will be the home team against JSerra. In the Foothill Division, Newport Harbor will travel to La Habra, but Corona del Mar will be at home against Paramount.

All five games will start at 3 p.m.

The tournament continues with pool play Saturday and the following Tuesday, as well as additional games March 9 and 11.