RedHawks shut out Bears to open SVL play

Pierce High found out on Tuesday how hard it is to beat a team that doesn't commit errors or hand out free passes in its Sacramento Valley League baseball opener against Colusa.

The RedHawks played a flawless game and took advantage of the few mistakes the Bears made to open the league schedule with an 8-0 victory in Colusa.

Kyle Cervantes struck out just two Pierce hitters and allowed six hits in seven innings of work, but he only walked one.

The Bears put runners in scoring position in the first and seventh innings, but Cervantes helped himself with great defense off the mound to prevent any runs from scoring. He escaped a situation with runners at second and third in the first inning by inducing a grounder back to the mound for the third out.

In the top of the seventh, Jake Voorhees led off with a single and advanced to second on a wild pitch with no outs, before Cervantes got the next two hitters to hit the ball right back at him. Twice, the junior pitcher looked Voorhees back to second and threw to first for the easy out, before tallying his second strikeout of the game for the final out.

"I was (surprised), I didn't think they hit that many to me," Cervantes said. All told, Cervantes grabbed six ground balls.

Cervantes pitched with a lead after senior Tyler Martin crushed a two-run double to the warning track in deep left field and scored on a throwing error for a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the first.

"We faced them a lot last year and beat them three times so we were pretty motivated," Martin said. "We were pretty confident, their pitcher (Hayden Kalfsbeek), we played a lot of baseball with him when we were younger so we knew him pretty well."

And though that familiarity paid off, Kalfsbeek kept his team in the game until the sixth inning. The junior righty struck out 11 RedHawks hitters and allowed seven hits in six innings.

Colusa added an unearned run in the fourth after Conner Herrick reached on an error and scored on a suicide squeeze by Shawn Friel to put them up 4-0.

Kalfsbeek sent the RedHawks down in order in the fifth inning before a three-hit barrage added four insurance runs.

"I want to get those dirty pitches in and get as many K's as I can but I trust my defense, they'll come through here pretty quick," Kalfsbeek said.

The RedHawks (4-2, 1-0 SVL) opened the Maxwell Tournament on Thursday against Williams, and traveled to Willows on Friday for the second league game. Colusa closes out the Maxwell Tournament today against Modoc and Maxwell.

The Bears (2-4, 0-1 SVL) hosted Durham in a league contest Friday.

CONTACT Kirk Barron at 458-2121 or kbarron@tcnpress.com.