Close counts for All-Stars

dpt-nbllgamer01TextHI285M4INB LL All-Stars baseball game story vs. Lake ForestDaily Pilot LAGUNA NIGUELBASEBALL: District 55 opener anything but a blowout for Newport Beach National contingent.Lake Forest American...3

Newport Beach National...0LAGUNA NIGUEL — At the end of six innings, there wasn’t a win to fill them up, but the Newport Beach National Little League Major All-Stars were still satisfied.

The team had managed, with a 3-0 loss to Lake Forest American, not to be ground into Little League pulp in the first round of the District 55 Tournament Saturday at Chapparosa Park.

And that was good enough for Newport Beach, after an efficient game that didn’t come close to invoking the 10-run mercy rule.

“This is big,” said Newport Beach Coach Jimmy Stone. “Obviously, you want to win, but if you asked us, 3-0 and a close game like that, and we have our two young guns ready for the next game, that’s about as good as we can do. What would have been best was a win. If not, this was OK.”

The prognostications for this game had been bleak.

“Everybody thought that we were going to get blown out, but we showed them,” said Max Stone, who was three for three and pitched a scoreless sixth inning in relief. “Lake Forest wins it usually and Newport just gets eliminated.”

Newport Beach was not eliminated. It has an elimination game Tuesday that obviously carries higher stakes. Newport Beach will face Aliso Canyon, which lost, 10-9, to Lake Forest National in a nine-inning game Saturday. But Stone felt confident about Tuesday.

“Everybody thought we were going to get blown out, and we showed them,” Max Stone said. “And [Lake Forest] is the best team. Any other team, we’re going to take them down.”

Jimmy Stone addressed his team with an upbeat voice after the game, which only lasted 65 minutes. Most Little League games are between two and three hours. The tournament director, Jimmy Stone told his team, said the game they played against Lake Forest was the best one he’d seen all day.

Neither team committed an error.

Ryan Griffin, who doubled with two outs in the first inning, rounded out the four-hit attack for Newport Beach, which received a scoreless fifth inning of relief from Luke Napolitano.

Lake Forest scored three runs in the top of the fourth inning.

Newport Beach pitcher Jack Harris went four innings, allowing four hits and three runs.

“They hit it into the gap,” Jimmy Stone said. “They hit two doubles, and that’s how they scored their runs. There’s nothing you can do about it. They’re a good baseball team, well-coached, and they don’t make any errors.”

Newport Beach put runners in scoring position in the fourth and fifth innings, when sacrifice bunts by Nick Dill and Drew Olson, respectively, advanced Stone and Napolitano to second.

But no Newport Beach runner advanced past second base.

Newport Beach is typically not one of the stronger teams because most of its members don’t eat, sleep and breathe baseball.

“When we’re competing against leagues like Lake Forest and Rancho Niguel, they’re playing 12 months of the year, and that’s not normally what we do,” Jimmy Stone said.

Frasier Anderson, Connor Roche, Rob Rosenast, Zac Davis, Blake Grable, Tommy Padia, and Tyler Maloney also contributed to Newport Beach’s efforts.

SORAYA NADIA McDONALD may be reached at (714) 966-4613 or [email protected].