Harvard-Westlake baseball to face rival Orange Lutheran in CIF-SS Division 1 semifinals
The Harvard-Westlake and Orange Lutheran baseball teams will meet Tuesday in a CIF Southern Section Division 1 semifinal game — the latest installment of one of the most competitive rivalries in SoCal baseball.
“You want to be the best, right? That’s what this is about,” Wolverines coach Jared Halpert said. “The scoreboard turns on, you want to win the game. You want to be the best, so whenever you get a chance to play a formidable opponent, you want some of that.”
Harvard-Westlake will travel to Orange to play Orange Lutheran at Hart Park at 6 p.m.
The two top-tier programs have already met three times this season and OLu came away with wins in two of those games — once on Feb. 15 at the Prep Baseball Report Spring Invitational and again on April 12 at the National High School Invitational.
Harvard-Westlake won an April 3 matchup. Each game was decided by one run.
“It’s the fourth time this year,” Halpert said. “They beat us twice and it it kind of feels meant to be if we get to get to dance with OLu one more time.”
Wolverines pitcher Duncan Marsten, a Wake Forest commit, recorded the first complete game of his career in a 5-4 win over San Dimas in the Division 1 quarterfinals Friday. He’s been steadfast on the mound throughout this season and can also provide a boost in the middle of Harvard-Westlake’s batting order.
@haleymsawyer Harvard-Westlake baseball is moving on to the Division 1 semifinals. #journalist #reporter #sports #highschoolsports #highschoolbaseball #studiocity #sandimas #pitching #pitcher #baseball
Texas commit and MLB prospect Bryce Rainer leads off for the Wolverines and has been one of the team’s most consistent hitters.
“He is arguably one of the best bats in the country,” Halpert said. “You’re either gonna risk him squaring a ball up or you’re gonna walk him and now we’ve got a well-above average runner on the bases. So it’s always a good start for the offense to have somebody like that at the top.”
Freshman Nate Blum has assumed the role of starting catcher after Drew Rico suffered a wrist injury. Blum hit eighth in the batting order against San Dimas and fellow freshman Asher Bunin has worked his way into the offense as a pinch runner.
Orange Lutheran’s Derek Curiel (LSU), the No. 109 MLB Draft prospect, has slashed .305/.407/.442 this season and has a team-high 29 hits along with 20 RBIs.
Senior pitcher Ross Clark (8-0) owns a 0.82 ERA in 34 1/3 innings and sophomore Gary Morse (5-2) has a 1.34 ERA in 52 1/3 innings of work.