After making a 150-mile trip from its Mountain View campus, St. Francis quickly made itself at home in its CIF NorCal Division II baseball final at top-seeded Yuba City.
But the Lancers’ two-run, first-inning lead Saturday afternoon was gone in a blink.
Yuba City answered with two in its half of the inning and then waited until the final frame to break the tie.
When it did — on a bases-loaded, one-out single by Max Guth — Yuba City captured the championship with a 3-2 victory.
For second-seeded St. Francis, it was its second walk-off defeat in as many trips to a NorCal final.
In the first season of the CIF’s regional baseball playoffs, three years ago, St. Francis allowed four runs in the bottom of the seventh to lose the Division I title game at De La Salle, 7-6.
This time, St. Francis was just hoping to force extra innings when the home team came to bat in the seventh.
The Lancers got the first out, but then Cesar Guizar, Wyatt Lane, Julian Garcia and Guth hit consecutive singles to end the game.
Yuba City finished 31-5. St. Francis fell to 22-11.
Landon King got St. Francis started in the first inning with a single. Jack Leeper was then hit by a pitch and Tanner Wall reached on an error to fill the bases.
Gino Cappellazzo hit into a fielder’s choice to make it 1-0 and Henry Dommer followed with a single to stretch the lead to 2-0.
But Yuba City retired the next two batters and kept St. Francis off the scoreboard the rest of the way.
Softball
Division II
No. 2 Salinas 4, No. 4 Liberty 1
Liberty scored 31 runs in two NorCal wins that moved the Lions into the championship game. The Brentwood school could have used a few of them Saturday.
Salinas’ Abi Jones capped off her high school career in spectacular fashion, holding North Coast Section Division I champion Liberty to just one unearned run while striking out 12 as the Cowboys captured their first regional softball title.
The home team scored a run in the first and another in the second to take a 2-0 lead. Liberty (25-5) cut the margin in half with a run in the visitor’s half of the third, but the Cowboys (21-8) answered with another run in the bottom half of the frame.
The lead widened to 4-1 when Salinas scored a run in the fifth.
Taylor Jennings and Kelsie Skaggs accounted for Liberty’s hits. Skaggs knocked in the Lions’ only run, on a single to right that brought in Kylee McKinney.
Gigi Rossi led Salinas’ attack with three hits — including a home run and a double — and scored twice.
Demarie Fernandez and Ava Thompson added two hits apiece for the Cowboys, who survived an eight-inning nail-biter to beat The King’s Academy 1-0 in the semifinals on Thursday.
Liberty reached the final with a 14-3 rout of Central Catholic in the first round on Tuesday and a 17-10 win over Vanden on Thursday.
Division IV
No. 1 East Nicolaus 4, No. 3 San Leandro 0
After rolling past Aptos by eight runs in a semifinal Friday, San Leandro had no such dominance in the final at top-seeded East Nicolaus.
The home team scored three in the first inning, and that was all Stevie Knight would need to win a regional championship for her side.
She held the visitors to one hit, striking out eight and walking two. Knight also had four hits and knocked in a run as East Nicolaus ended the season 24-6.
San Leandro finished 23-9.