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Hidalgo rallied from a two-run deficit in the seventh inning to prevail 5-4 in its Class 4A area round play-off game against Boerne in Corpus Christi.
The Pirates trailed 3-0 into the fourth inning and 3-1 into the seventh.
“They were putting pressure on us and we had a hard time adjusting to it,” Hidalgo coach Karlos Carrasco said. “I talked to the boys before that seventh inning and told them, ‘Hey, one pitch at a time. One at-bat at a time.’ Those seniors, they didn’t want their season to end.”
Danny Espinosa led the inning off with a triple. Kike Mendoza’s double the next at-bat scored Espinosa. Oscar Noguera was intentionally walked. Dylan Hernandez hit a single.
An error scored another Hidalgo run, and then with two outs Allan Wilburn drilled a two-run bomb to right field for a 5-3 lead.
“It took us awhile to get into rhythm,” Carrasco said. “They were keeping us off balance and we struggled early.”
The Pirates improved to 21-5-1 and advanced to play Rockport-Fulton in the regional quarters next week.
EAGLE PASS 10, EDINBURG HIGH 9; EDINBURG HIGH 1, EAGLE PASS 0: At Laredo, the Bobcats watched the Eagles sneak out a Game 2 win to knot up the Class 6A best-of-three area series before Edinburg High held on for the big Game 3 win.
Luis Ortega pitched seven innings and struck out five in Game 3.
The Bobcats improved to 21-3-1.
VICTORIA EAST 9, EDINBURG VELA 1: At Corpus Christi, Victoria East completed the sweep of Vela in their Class 5A best-of-three area playoff series.
The win capped a strong season for Vela, which made the playoffs for the first time in program history and followed that up with a bi-district championship last weekend.
The SaberCats finished the season 15-10.
LAREDO ALEXANDER 11, EDINBURG NORTH 5; LAREDO ALEXANDER 12, EDINBURG NORTH 2: At Zapata, Laredo Alexander rallied from a 1-0 series deficit to sweep Saturday’s games and advance to the Class regional quarterfinals, where it will meet La Joya Palmview next week.
Laredo Alexander won Game 3 in five innings.Edinburg North led Game 2 3-0 and Game 2-0 before falling short in each game.
The Cougars finished the season 18-8.
CALALLEN 12, SHARYLAND HIGH 6: At Calallen, the Wildcats finished off the Rattlers in a demonstrative sweep of their Class 5A area playoff series.
After the two teams wrapped up a Game 1 16-0 Calallen win at 1:45 a.m. Saturday morning, Calallen delivered another knockout to the Rattlers, scoring seven runs in the fourth inning to pull away.
This came after Calallen had 16 hits in Game 1 and a no-hitter going into the fifth inning.
“Yeah, it affected us,” Sharyland coach Junior Martinez told the Corpus Christi Caller-Times about the effects from Game 1. “But that kid last night he was lights out. This guy today, we hit him OK, but they hit us even better. That’s a good-hitting team. That’s probably the best-hitting team we’ve seen in four or five years.”