Serra’s Pitcher Can’t Stop Point Loma

SAN DIEGO —  The last time No. 7-ranked Point Loma High School and City Eastern League rival Serra played, Jim Finn threw a three-hitter to lead Serra to a 9-2 victory.

But Friday, Finn didn’t even get out of the third inning. Point Loma got eight runs and six hits off him en route to a 15-8 victory at Serra.

Coupled with Morse’s 3-2 loss to Mira Mesa, the victory gave Point Loma (5-2 in league and 16-5 overall) sole possession of first place. Serra is 3-3-1 and 12-7-1.

Was extra batting practice the reason for Point Loma’s rejuvenated offense? Coach Bill Hall wasn’t sure.

“That’s the way I thought we’d hit all year long,” he said. “I don’t know why we hit the ball today as well as we did. At least the players wanted to attribute it to the extra batting practice, but I don’t know.”

e Actually, some Point Loma hitters have been hot lately. Catcher Pat Evenson, hitting .492 going into the game, went 3 for 5 with three RBIs Friday. J.J. Northam, hitting more than .400 at the start of the day, went 2 for 4.

The problem was, Point Loma wasn’t generating many runs. It defeated Patrick Henry, 5-2, Wednesday, but two of the runs resulted from an outfield error.

Hall had changed around the lineup before the Patrick Henry game. He moved Evenson from the cleanup spot to third in the order, and dropped Kelly Schlager from third to seventh.

“I looked back at other games, and Pat was leading off too many innings with singles,” Hall said.

The change paid off early Friday.

After Walt Edwards reached base on an error in the first inning, Evenson doubled him home. The next batter, Jim Brasher, singled Evenson in. Then, after Rigo Beltran and Noah Tafoya each singled, the second hit scoring Brasher, Schlager hit a long two-run home run to right to cap the six-run rally.

Beltran was 4 for 4 with two RBIs.

Point Loma’s Chris Redding didn’t pitch his best game, but he didn’t have to. He allowed eight runs and seven hits in 5 innings and improved his record to 10-2.