Prep baseball: Solle’s gem not enough as Redwood falls in NCS final

ROHNERT PARK >> Redwood High’s Rex Solle powered his way through seven scoreless innings in a pitchers’ duel with Cardinal Newman’s Josh Jannicelli that dominated Saturday’s North Coast Section championship showcase at Sonoma State University.

Just as the crowd was settling in for the long haul in the bottom of the eighth inning, Cardinal Newman’s Diego Boardman hit a short grounder off Giants reliever Matthew Knauer to score the winning run as the top-seeded Cardinals edged the second-seeded Giants, 1-0, to claim the NCS Division II pennant.

“Those were two [NCAA] Division I arms going at each other. That was as advertised,” Redwood head coach Mike Firenzi said. “They have a hell of a hitting team and so do we. We’ve both got great pitchers just matching each other pitch for pitch. Both teams got stuck in a couple of jams and then got out of it.”

UCLA-bound Solle struggled to find the strike zone in the first inning, issuing three walks, before he found his target. Solle limited Cardinal Newman to four hits, with four total walks and five strikeouts through seven innings.

“There were big changes adjusting to this mound and then just making sure my mechanics were all synched up and just making sure I was attacking them,” Solle said.

On the other side of the matchup, UC Santa Barbara commit Jannicelli had the Giants hitters swinging at ghosts with 13 strikeouts and three hits through seven innings. Both pitchers looked like they could have carried their battle another few innings, but both were flirting with the 100-pitch count after seven innings.

“Rex pitched his heart out today,” Firenzi said. “He carried us on his back. He did everything he could until he had no more. He was right up to his pitch limit when he left with all zeroes on the board. We’re so proud of him.”

The Cardinals (25-5), who won the NCS D-III crown the past two seasons, secured their berth in the NorCal Regionals. Redwood (26-4) will have to wait until Sunday to see if the team’s resume is enough to earn an at-large berth.

After being stymied in the NCS D-II semifinals each of the past two years, Redwood found itself in the championship game for the first time since 2015, when the Giants beat Livermore for the pennant. Redwood was 2-1 in one-run games during the NCS tournament, beating MCAL rival Tam, 2-1, and Petaluma, 3-2 in the first two rounds, then knocking off Ukiah, 9-2, in the semifinals. Petaluma and Ukiah were the two finalists in the 2022 NCS D-II championship game.

After the Cardinals loaded the bases in the bottom of the first inning, Solle got some backup with a play at second on a groundout to end the inning without any damage. Bolstered by the determination of his Giants teammates, Solle stood bigger on the mound and threw harder through the next six innings.

“That was the biggest thing, just confidence,” Solle said. “Just being able to use whatever pitch I can to just attack and just go right at them.”

The Cardinals again had runners on third base in the fourth and sixth innings, but both times Solle clamped down on Cardinal Newman to keep the game scoreless.

Jannicelli struck out six of the first seven batters he faced in the first two innings, with only Solle connecting for a single in the first inning.

The Giants had a chance to break the game apart in the top of the fourth inning after Gavin Soper singled. After a sacrifice bunt from Solle, Sam Gersch singled to give the Giants runners at the corners with one out and Jack Moseley at the plate.

With the Cardinals distracted at second base by Gersch’s aborted sacrifice play, Soper broke for the plate, but second baseman Jacob Moreda saw him and his throw to catcher Konnor Rodnick was on target for the out at home. A groundout by Moseley then ended the threat and the inning.

Gersch found himself on second base again in the top of the seventh inning with one out, but Jannicelli struck out the next two batters.

Solle answered in the bottom of the seventh, with Cardinal Newman’s Carson Meyer on second and one out, with a pair of strikeouts to send the game into extra innings.

The Giants went down in order in the top of the eighth. The Giants’ Knauer walked the first two batters he saw in relief, and a sac bunt moved the runners to second and third. Cardinal Newman’s Boardman then put the ball in play to bring Jack Pezzolo around for the winning run.

“This was a very emotional game,” Firenzi said. “We got punched in the stomach. We’ve got to come back after the weekend and get them ready again for whatever happens next. But we represented our school and our league proudly.”