EDH advances to championship round of 10-11 All-Star tourney

Before the 10-11-year-old All-Star Tournament began June 22, the contingent from El Dorado Hills felt like they had a team that could win the tournament. On Sunday, the El Dorado Hills All-Stars punched their ticket to the championship round with a convincing, 6-0 win over Folsom American. El Dorado Hills awaits the winner between Folsom American and Lakeside, who they will play in the championship game at 6:30 p.m. on July 3. If El Dorado Hills wins, they will be champions of the 10-11 All-Star tournament. If they lose, they will play the same team at 2 p.m. Saturday to determine the All-Star bracket champions. On Sunday under a blazing hot afternoon sun, George Bergamo took the mound for El Dorado Hills and was magnificent, as he pitched five shutout innings, allowing only two hits, while striking out eight. His game was not without some adversity, but he pitched out of it every time it arose. Bergamo walked Brody McGowan and Carter Costa with one out in the first inning, but got out of that inning with a pair of strikeouts. In the second inning, Bergamo was even more impressive, as Folsom American put its first two batters on base with a hit (Charlie Juchinski) and an error (Gunnar Tolson), but Bergamo then struck out the side to end that inning. In the fifth inning with one out, Bergamo walked Tolson and then Ranger Hightower singled to put two runners on. Madden Padilla moved the runners to second and third with a sacrifice bunt before Bergamo got Blake MacDonald to pop out to second base to end the inning. Every time trouble emerged, Bergamo rose to the occasion. "Oh, George Bergamo, I love that kid," El Dorado Hills Manager Jason Reichard said. "He's great. He dealt today, and he dealt with some adversity. He pitched well with traffic on. I couldn't be happier for that kid. He's something else." Offensively, El Dorado Hills scored one run in the second inning, two runs in the fourth and three in the fifth, as they just kept the pressure on Folsom American the whole game. Logan Flores threw well, but didn't have the success that Bergamo had. In the second inning with one out, Matt Gabbard walked, advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on a double by Brady Gill. In the fourth inning, Flores walked the first two batters, Aayden Whitworth and Logan Reichard. Flores got the next two outs and had runners on first and third with Bergamo at the plate. A wild pitch scored Whitworth and Bergamo followed with a double to drive in Reichard to give El Dorado Hills a 3-0 lead. Gill led off the fifth inning with his second double of the game. An out later, Wilson Center was hit by a pitch and Flores was replaced on the mound by Zach Schafer. Colton Cagle greeted Schafer with an RBI single putting EDH in front 4-0. An infield single by CJ Ard drove in another run before Reichard singled with the bases loaded to knock in El Dorado Hills' sixth and final run. El Dorado Hills got a lot of big hits at big times. "Anytime you face a good pitcher that we faced today, you have to grind against them," Reichard said. "You win pitch by pitch, bat by bat, foul pitches off, work walks, whatever you can do to get his pitch count up and get him out of the game and get on to someone else. I feel like the kids did a really good job with that today."