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Sports

Little League All-Stars Out of Playoffs

North Venice's Junior team falls to Encino and Saticoy in Tehachapi.

The North Venice Little League Baseball Junior All-Stars were riding a wave of confidence heading into Sunday's morning's Sub Division III North Tournament game against Encino. 

The team had won eight of its nine postseason games--five by mercy rule--and seemed poised to steamroll its way into the championship game.

Not so fast.

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After taking a 2-1 lead in the bottom of the first inning, North Venice's heavy bats suddenly fell silent as the team managed only one run over the final six innings of a 5-3 loss to the Section 2 champion at the Tehachapi Little League fields.

Continuing his hot hitting from the previous game in which he went three for three with two home runs against Saticoy, Matt Kassowitz went two for two with two walks against Encino and accounted for half of North Venice's hits. The others were by Peter Rolon and Javier Garcia, who each had an RBI along with Isaac Yoshinaga.

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Rolon pitched the first five innings, allowing five hits and three earned runs with two strikeouts, Garcia did not allow a hit in one and two-thirds innings of relief and Kyle Brisacher got the final out in the top of the seventh. 

"Peter pitched very well in the first game but our offense disappeared," North Venice Manager Allan Hanckel said. "My guess is that they were a little tired, the tank was empty. We've never had everyone hitting at the same time. One game, two or three guys would get hot, another game it'd be another two guys, but never everyone at once."

The defeat to Encino dropped North Venice down to the loser's bracket of the double-elimination tournament, where later in the day it had a rematch with Section 1 champion Saticoy--a team it had routed 17-6 in the first round. 

This time it was a different story, as Saticoy scored seven runs in the bottom of the first inning and another run in the second inning to build an 8-1 lead. North Venice answered with four runs in the third and another run in the fourth, but was ultimately done in by five errors in a 9-7 defeat.

Garcia went three for three, Tucie Shelp went two for two and each hit a home run. Brisacher and Gyasi Washington each had added one hit, one run and one RBI, Daniel Raygosa doubled and Rolon singled and scored once as North Venice's playoff run came to an abrupt end. 

"In the afternoon game, they had a very good pitcher who wasn't able to go the first time we played them," Hanckel said. "We just made a number of errors all over the field that essentially gave them three runs and again our hitting just wasn't there."

Raygosa allowed two hits and one run in two innings of relief for North Venice, which finished 8-3. North Venice beat West Los Angeles to win the District 25 title and beat Manhattan Beach 12-2 in five innings to win the Section 4 championship last Wednesday in Culver City. 

Every player but three--Brisacher, Anthony Arango and Christian Santiestaban--moves up to the Senior division (ages 15-16) next season.

"It was a lot of fun and the team accomplished a lot of good things," Hanckel said of his first year managing. "The goal for this group was to try to get them to focus on character. To be sacrificial for the sake of their teammates and the team, and they did that." 

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