KEVIN LU | SPECIAL TO THE MONITOR
ELSA — Edcouch-Elsa’s baseball team needed eight innings to beat rival Mercedes in a 6-5 home win Tuesday night.
The win puts the Yellowjackets a game ahead of Mercedes with three games left in District 32-5A play. They had identical 6-4 records entering the night.
Edcouch-Elsa now sits in third in district, with Mercedes falling to fourth. The Yellowjackets swept the season series.
Edcouch-Elsa walked off with the win on a Raul Quintero flare to right field in the bottom of the eighth inning that scored pitcher Jacob Martinez. Martinez led off the inning reaching base on an error, the eighth error committed by the Tigers’ defense.
The other five Yellowjacket runs were all unearned after they came off Tigers’ defensive miscues during the first three innings.
“We just want to make the playoffs. Of course, this is a rivalry. You saw what it takes to win,” Edcouch-Elsa coach Xavier Acosta said.
Mercedes added a pair of runs during the fourth inning, and pulled to within 5-3 in the fifth on an Oliver Closner single to right field that scored Joel Torres. Three batters later, pitcher Henry Luna drove a double over the leftfielder’s head to score two and tie the game at 5.
The Tigers had a chance to add more runs during the fifth inning if it weren’t for a spectacular defensive play by Edcouch-Elsa’s Eddie Lopez. Mercedes had runners at second and third base with two outs. Jaime Rodriguez ripped a liner to third base that Lopez dove to his right to stop before throwing across the diamond from his knees to end the inning.
“It’s just a great rivalry and these kids are so hungry and thirsty for a playoff game that they’ll do whatever it takes. It showed today,” Acosta said.
When the Tigers weren’t giving away outs defensively, they gave some away on offense as well. The first two Mercedes batters during the second inning reached base, but the seventh and eighth spot hitters batted out of place and the team was assessed an additional out, effectively killing the rally.
Luna pitched seven innings, allowed six hits for six unearned runs, and struck out eight Yellowjacket batters. His counterpart Martinez went eight innings, allowed four earned runs on eight hits and tallied eight strikeouts.
“He’s beaten Mercedes twice and it’s a great win for him,” Acosta said of Martinez. “Sometimes we just don’t get him enough runs and he pitches great all the time.”