Agoura and Calabasas battle in non-league baseball
By Steve Ames
Special to The Acorn

MICHAEL COONS/The Acorn GOOD HUSTLE-Agoura's Matt Lawyer attempts to make a shoe-string catch in game vs. Calabasas which was won by the Chargers, 8-5, at Calabasas High School, Monday.

Agoura High’s Chargers of the Marmonte League and the Calabasas High Coyotes of the Frontier League might not meet each other in baseball until they’re both in the Marmonte League next year–unless it’s in the playoffs.

But meanwhile they’ll have a lot to think about after the visiting Chargers came out the winner 8-5 on Monday as both teams tuned up for their respective league races.

"Brandon Canning threw well," Agoura head coach Zach Miller said after the game. "We had great pitching. It starts with pitching."

With reference to the Coyotes, Miller said that they are great team.

"Just because they play in a league that isn’t as competitive as other leagues around–and that’s not to knock them–they do their job, they have the people," he said. "This was a pretty scary game when we set it up. We had a lot to lose here.

"This (Calabasas) is a great team. They’ve been together longer than we have. They’re veterans and it’s quite possible that we could see them down the road in the playoffs. The breaks happened to bounce our way. We hit the ball harder than they did."

Jason Lefkowitz was 2 for 4 including a double and Bryan Huston also doubled, J.T. Trelatsky went 2 for 4 and homered. Drew Saberhagen doubled for Calabasas.

Calabasas took a 1-0 lead in the second inning on a double by Saberhagen and a single by Matt Green. But Agoura came back with four runs in the third inning paced by Bryan Huston’s double and Casey McCarthy’s single. The Coyotes added one each in the fourth and fifth innings led by singles by Illie Kramar, Matt Green, Shane Hunter and Justin Segal.

With Agoura ahead 4-3 in the seventh inning the Chargers put the game out of reach for good. With one out and Brian Grant, Adam Schneider and Ashley Trujillo aboard, J.T. Trelatsky powered a grand slam home run over the centerfield fence.

Calabasas struck for two runs in its home half of the seventh on hits by Segal and Aaron Lowenstein, a walk to Kramar and an error that allowed John Henry Jacobs to reach first base. But the next two batters went down to end the game.

"I wanted to say," Miller said, "we played great defense until we had the errant throw in the seventh. They battled and it’s a rivalry from now on with them coming into our league. It’s going to be competitive. Rick Nathanson has his program going in the right direction, and he’s got some big kids."

Nathanson said that several times he tried to schedule Agoura during the ’90s, but the two teams met only a few times. But now that they have met this season and with Calabasas moving to the Marmonte, he’s looking forward to playing the Chargers and the other teams in that league.

"This young coach Zach Miller is a fiery guy," he said. "He’s a good coach and he’s got his guys ready. And they were hungrier than we were, in my opinion."

For the Calabasas pitcher Brad Schultz it was his first start of the year. He is 11-2 coming into this year and has been on the Coyote varsity as a pitcher for three years.

"He’s the kind of a kid who is not going to overpower you," his coach said. "But when he’s on he’s going to get people out. I knew this would be a real tough game to bring him back. I really thought long and hard on whom to pitch. I made the decision to go with Brad.

"He did not have his best stuff. They took advantage of some good pitches, and I thought we made some mistakes that kept the game close. But my hat’s off to them. We hit a lot of balls hard that could have changed the game. They came up and made almost every defensive play."

Nathanson said that he thought Calabasas had a chance to beat Canning, Agoura’s starting and winning pitcher. "I don’t think he overpowered us," he said. "But he got good outs when he had to."

The crusher, the coach said, was Trelatsky’s round-tripper.

"Obviously that grand slam home run in the seventh inning completely changed the game," he said. "If we get that out and things go the way they did, we might have come back. But you can’t play baseball on hindsight. We’re still a quality club. I expect us to bounce back this Friday when we start league against Santa Paula.

"Truly what you play for is the post-season. We hope to defend our league championship. We won in ’93, ‘95, ’96, ’97, ’99, and 2001. We won three in a row and won two of the last four."

Nathanson sees Nordhoff High as a team that will be competitive against Calabasas this year because the Rangers have a couple of good pitchers and Santa Paula High because the Cardinals always have three or four boys who can swing the bat.