NEW Baseball State Top 20

Buchanan stays on top following victory over another State Top 20 team earlier this week in a tournament championship. Previous No. 2 Chatsworth, however, has to drop after falling to unbeaten Harvard-Westlake in a different tourney final. New teams going in this week in rankings that are counting scores from earlier this week are Bellarmine of San Jose, Chaminade of West Hills, Oaks Christian of Westlake Village and Archbishop Mitty of San Jose.

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(Records through scores of Wednesday, March 8)
(Stockton office assistant editor Paul Muyskens contributed to this post)

1. (1) Buchanan (Clovis) 7-0
After giving up an early run and trailing 1-0 entering the third inning, the Bears bore down and scooted past previous No. 8 Clovis 3-1 in the title game of the Coca Cola Classic, played on Tuesday. Cal-bound Carson Olson pitched six strong innings before giving way to Kyle McKenney for the save. Buchanan was scheduled to play on Thursday vs. Beyer of Modesto.

2. (3) South Hills (West Covina) 4-0
Stanford commit Brandon Dieter struck out seven and gave up four hits in six innings as the Huskies blanked Carter of Rialto 6-0 earlier this week. Carter was an opponent that also was showing in this week’s L.A. Times Top 25 Rankings so it does qualify as a quality win.

3. (4) Huntington Beach 4-0
The Oilers also move up one spot this week, mainly due to a 7-2 victory over previous No. 9 Orange Lutheran that featured another monster outing from Hagen Danner. All he did in that game was hit two homers and strike out six in a dominant outing on the hill. Huntington Beach is playing No. 13 JSerra in a double-header on Saturday.

4. (7) De La Salle (Concord) 3-0
Big wins already are piling up early for the Spartans, who are being jumped to fourth also because of their position in at least two national polls. After topping two state-ranked foes in their first two games (current No. 14 Bellarmine of San Jose and previous No. 15 Elk Grove), DLS then added another win over perennial power Serra of San Mateo.

5. (5) Eastlake (Chula Vista) 2-0
It was over early in the Titans’ first game this week, which ended up being a 21-0 romp past San Diego Hgh. THey also won their first game against Coronado. This weekend, the team’s strength of schedule will being to pick up with games at the Aztec/Foothiller Invitational.

6. (6) Rancho Bernardo (San Diego) 1-0
A clutch, late home run by All-American candidate Calvin Mitchell was the difference when the Broncos opened their season with a 2-1 triumph against Granite Hills of El Cajon.

7. (10) Harvard-Westlake (North Hollywood) 6-0
The Wolverines handed previous No. 2 Chatsworth a 3-1 defeat on Tuesday of this week in the championship game of the Easton tourney. There was good news everywhere from UCLA-committed junior Jesse Burgin throwing three-plus shutout innings in his first appearance in three months to freshman standout Drew Bowser connecting for a two-run triple. Harvard-Westlake won in the semifinals against previously state-ranked Valencia.

8. (2) Chatsworth 4-1
This is where the Chancellors fall after their 3-1 loss to Harvard-Westlake in the title game of the Easton tourney. In their 7-1 semifinal win against Oaks Christian of Westlake Village, Thomas Gutierrez shined by pitching five shutout innings. Adding more interest in the matchup vs. Harvard-Westlake is the fact that Wolverines’ head coach Jared Halpert along with Wolverines’ pitching coach Joe Guntz played at Chatsworth under current Chancellors’ head coach Tom Muesborn.

9. (9) Lutheran (Orange) 2-1
The Lancers hold tight at No. 9 following their 7-2 loss to Huntington Beach. Before that, they won a pair of games over Dana Hills of Dana Point (2-1 and 13-0) and will play Cypress in a pair next week. Zach Low and Garrett Mitchell have both gone 5-for-9 in the early games to lead the offense so far.

10. (13) Cathedral Catholic (San Diego) 1-0
Juniors Cade Brown and Noah Owen pitched the Dons to a grind-it-out 2-1 win in eight innings over La Costa Canyon of Carlsbad to start the season. It was the type of matchup you’d expect from teams led by State Coaches of the Year Gary Remiker of CC and Justin Machado of LCC. The Dons will next by playing in the Hilltop-Lolitas tourney and had a game scheduled for Thursday vs. El Capitan of Lakeside.

11. (11) Oak Ridge (El Dorado Hills) 0-0
Head coach Todd Melton’s team still hasn’t started and in those cases we generally tend to just leave those teams in the rankings where they were. Oak Ridge will play Napa in its first game on Saturday and will play defending CIF Sac-Joaquin Section D1 champ Elk Grove later next week.

12. (8) Clovis 6-1-1
Mason Grotto was the highlight player for the Cougars in their 3-1 loss to No. 1 Buchanan in the final game of the Coca Cola Classic as he went 3-for-3 against Bears’ pitching. The highlight of the last week, though, was head coach James Patrick winning his 700th game last Thurdsay when Clovis defeated Centennial of Bakersfield.

13. (16) JSerra (San Juan Capistrano) 0-0
Although the Lions still haven’t played any games yet, we’re still going to move them up to 13th. That’s mainly due to their extremely tough schedule, which gets going Saturday in a double-header with No. 3 Huntington Beach.

14. (NR) Bellarmine (San Jose) 3-1
The Bells started off with a loss to De La Salle, but now the Spartans are up to No. 4 and they’ve also posted three quality wins in a row against Casa Grande of Petaluma, Franklin of Elk Grove and Jesuit of Carmichael. In the 7-1 triumph vs. Jesuit, Joe Ammirata pitched five strong innings with just two hits allowed. Cole Parrish also went 2-for-4 with two RBI.

15. (NR) Chaminade (West Hills) 5-0
In a 9-2 victory over Grace Brethren of Simi Valley this week that kept the Eagles unbeaten, senior Reece Weinberg went nuts with three hits and five RBI, including a homer and a triple. Freshman Carter Graham also has been great and had nine RBI. Chaminade will obviously be tested in the Mission League so debuting the team this high is a case of future strength of schedule.

16. (NR) Oaks Christian (Westlake Village) 4-1
The Lions will be fun to follow all season since they’re coached by former S.F. Giants’ and former Playa del Rey St. Bernard all-state player Royce Clayton. Coach Clayton’s boys have lost only to No. 8 Chatsworh and has quality wins against West Ranch of Valencia, Notre Dame of Sherman Oaks and previously state-ranked Valencia.

17. (NR) Archbishop Mitty (San Jose) 5-0
It’s been the Haydn and Aidan show for the Monarchs so far as in USF-bound senior ace Haydn King and senior Aidan Goicovich. King threw five innings of no-hit ball in the first game vs. Monterey and started this week with seven innings with no hits and no runs allowed. But he’s not the one who’s picked up three pitching wins. That would be Goicovich, who had a 0.47 ERA in 15 innings pitched. If Mitty had played a tougher schedule, we might have put the Monarchs ahead of Bellarmine but other than beating Valley Christian the Bells having wins over Casa Grande, Franklin of Elk Grove and Jesuit is a bit better.

18. (17) Los Gatos 4-0-1
We’re going to leave in the Wildcats because they’re still unbeaten following a tie against Leland of San Jose. They also notched a win since the last rankings over Pioneer of San Jose to go along with more significant wins over Valley Christian and St. Francis of Mountain View.

19. (20) Tracy 2-0
Andrew Tavares collected three hits while seven other players all had two when the Bulldogs clobbered Antioch 21-3 in their second game of the season. They also already have a win against Freedom of Oakley. This week, Tracy will be in its own Tracy Booster Club tourney. There are other tough games looming, including one against Oak Ridge.

20. (NR) Monte Vista (Danville) 5-0
For beating previous No. 18 College Park and for winning in four other outings to start the year, the Mustangs were rewarded with a Top 20 state ranking. Jack Murphy played like he belonged in the old Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego by going 4-for-5 with four RBI against the Falcons. He later jacked up a homer, double and knocked in six runs in a 13-10 win vs. Cardinal Newman of Santa Rosa. The Mustangs will eventually run into No. 4 De La Salle in the East Bay Athletic League.

Teams That Dropped Out:
Previous No. 12 Mater Dei (Santa Ana); No. 14 Valencia; No. 15 Elk Grove; No. 18 College Park (Pleasant Hill); No. 19 Gahr (Cerritos).

Teams On The Bubble
Alemany (Mission Hills) 4-1
Ayala (Chino Hills) 6-0
Beckman (Irvine) 5-1
Clayton Valley (Concord) 3-0
Clovis North (Fresno) 5-1
College Park (Pleasant Hill) 2-1
Davis 2-1
Elk Grove 0-2
El Toro (Lake Forest) 2-2
Hart (Newhall) 3-1
Los Alamitos 4-1
Mater Dei (Santa Ana) 3-1
Mission Viejo 5-1
Redlands East Valley (Redlands) 5-0
Redondo Union (Redondo Beach) 2-1
Redwood (Visalia) 5-0
Sacred Heart Cathedral (SF) 6-0
Vacaville 5-0

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