El Modena’s Greg Koutures right, tagged out at the plate by Villa Park catcher Shawn Romero, left, in Crestview League baseball game in Villa Park on Friday, April 12, 2024. (Photo by Paul Rodriguez, Contributing Photographer)
VILLA PARK – Ten of Villa Park’s 22 games were decided by one run going into the Spartans’ game Friday against El Modena.
Going into this week Villa Park had played five games in a row decided by two or fewer runs.
“Playing those tight games has helped us,” said Villa Park coach Burt Call. “Especially today.”
The Spartans beat El Modena 1-0 on Friday in a Crestview League game at Villa Park High. Villa Park and El Modena are tied for first place with 3-2 records.
Senior right-hander Aaron Sambath shut out El Modena through five innings. After El Modena started the sixth inning with back-to-back singles, junior right-hander Ryan Nobles replaced Sambath and retired six Vanguards in a row including two strikeouts to finish the win.
Villa Park senior Ryan Tims homered in the second inning as the Spartans completed a two-game sweep of El Modena, including a 6-1 win over the Vanguards on Wednesday.
Sambath gave up six hits, struck out five and walked only one batter. He improved to 5-1 and lowered his ERA to 0.45.
“I don’t know how many balls he (Sambath) threw today,” Tims said. “But I know it wasn’t many.”
Sambath used breaking pitches to get ahead of counts.
“The breaking ball felt great today,” Sambath said. “The fastball’s not always there so I got to rely on a couple other pitches. I trust my defense behind me and just let them work.”
El Modena right-handed pitcher Nick Santivanez was outstanding. He gave up just two hits, both in the second inning including Tims’ homer. Santivanez walked three and struck out five.
Tims said he was looking for fastballs to hit on his at bat that produced his second home run of the season.
“The first pitch was a fastball right down the middle,” said Tims, who committed to Washington. “The second pitch was pretty much the same pitch, a fastball right down middle, maybe a little bit up, and that was the pitch I did damage on.”
Santivanez is 4-1 with a 0.66 ERA.
“Santivanez is a great pitcher,” said Tims who also pitches and is 4-2 with a 0.71 ERA. “All props to him. For me the game plan was to attack the fastball and when he gave me that fastball I just got my hands out and extended them, and it felt good.”
Villa Park lost two outstanding pitchers to graduation from last year’s team, Zach Brown and Brandon Liu. Sambath, Tims and Nobles have continued the tradition of pitching excellence in Spartans baseball.
“We had only 10 innings (of varsity pitching experience) combing back from last year,” Call said. “We knew Tims is a good pitcher because he beat JSerra in the Boras Classic finals two years ago and we knew Sambath would be a quality pitcher. Both have been outstanding and Nobles has been great for us, too.”
Villa Park is 14-9 overall and No. 8 in the Orange County Top 25. The Spartans play Foothill (2-3 in league) twice next week starting with a home game Wednesday.
El Modena is 13–6 overall and No. 11 in the county rankings. The Vanguards have a nonleague home game against Brea Olinda on Saturday at 10 a.m. They play El Dorado (2-3 in league) in two league games next week starting with a home game Wednesday.
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