Tahquitz takes early lead in 6-0 win over Liberty

Logan Paad delivers a pitch during Liberty's game on Friday. (Phhoto by Rick Rowell)

By Paige Mendez, Correspondent

The Liberty High School baseball team lost its league matchup with Tahquitz 6-0 at home Friday afternoon. Coming off a 10-run win against Perris on Monday, the Bison were hoping to find their fifth league win, but found, instead, their third regular-season loss.

Tahquitz started their attack early with a grand slam from Miguel Campos after the bases were loaded by consecutive walks. The struggle from the mound was one the three Liberty pitchers couldn’t quite overcome, throwing just four strikeouts and seven walks in the 37 batters they faced. They also gave up a combined six hits and five earned runs.

The remaining two runs from Tahquitz came in the second and seventh innings. The first came from a single that brought in a runner who had doubled two at-bats prior. The second came from a sacrifice fly to right field after the scorer had singled to get on base.

Liberty’s three pitchers were Jonas Phipps, Logan Paad and Cody Smith, in that order.

Head coach Scott Montgomery said the struggle of giving up those runs is one his team can normally bounce back from.

“Part of the ability to compete is learning to absorb the blows and we took kind of a blow in the first inning,” Montgomery said. “I’d be lying if I said it didn’t rattle us a bit, but normally this is a team that’s very gritty and they’re able to compete even when they’re behind.”

But Tahquitz had their own way to compete that the Bison just couldn’t respond to, despite the four hits from Jake Feidner (single), Evan Gonzales (single), Ian Slater (single) and Luis De La Riva (double).

Pitcher Sebastian Gutierrez, who picked up the win for Tahquitz, struck out seven of the 17 batters he faced and allowed just three hits. Garin Meyer, who took over after Gutierrez, pitched six straight outs in the last two innings of the game to seal the deal for his team.

Montgomery said he takes responsibility for needing to teach this level of competition to his team -- a new and young program -- but that part of it is something that they will just need time to develop.

“Today was a good lesson for us to compete better in all facets of the game and that’s my responsibility to teach that,” he said. “But you’ve got to just chalk this one up to experience and try to move forward and not hang our heads about it.

“So far these guys have shown a lot of heart in our games,” he said. “We’re going to continue to teach the game here and hopefully we get more people in the community involved and know that this is going to be a good place for baseball."

Landon Spicer settles under a pop fly for Liberty on Friday. (Photo by Rick Rowell)