LAKE COUNTY — Ranging in seeds from 2-13, five Lake County varsity baseball and softball teams are alive and well as play opens today and Wednesday in the North Coast Section playoffs at venues scattered throughout Northern California.
Extending their season by at least one more game are the Clear Lake (17-7), Middletown (15-9) and Kelseyville (12-10) baseball teams and the Clear Lake (20-4) softball squad in Division IV, and the Upper Lake (11-8) softball team in Division V.
Lake County”s playoff teams include two outright league champions ? Middletown of the North Central League I North in baseball and Clear Lake of the NCL I South in softball ? as well as one co-champion ? Clear Lake of the NCL I South in baseball.
The Middletown boys and Clear Lake girls earned automatic playoff berths by virtue of winning their respective league titles while the Clear Lake and Kelseyville baseball teams and the Upper Lake softball squad received at-large berths.
In today”s opening-round games in Division IV baseball, No. 12 seed Middletown hosts No. 5 Marin Catholic (14-11) of Kentfield at 5 p.m. at Wes Martin Field, and No. 13 Kelseyville visits No. 4 St. Joseph Notre Dame (15-8) of Alameda at 5 p.m. at the College of Alameda.
“Anyone playing in the Marin County Athletic League faces a lot of good pitching and hitting all season long,” Middletown coach Mitch Tucker said of Marin Catholic.
Fans attending the game will see an interesting sight as Marin Catholic will be swinging wooden bats. The Kentfield school dumped its aluminum bats in mid-March, just days after one of the team”s top players, Gunnar Sandberg, nearly died after being struck in the head by a ball hit with an aluminum bat. The injury and Sandberg”s slow and long recovery has prompted a debate within the high school sports community about the safety of aluminum bats and whether they should be banned.
A number of Marin Catholic”s opponents this season have used wooden bats as a tribute to Sandberg.
While sympathetic to Sandberg”s cause, Tucker said the Mustangs would use aluminum bats just as in their previous 24 games this season.
“We don”t mean to be disrespectful, it”s just that their guys have been using wood bats for two and a half months. If we all start off the season like that, that”s fine, but not for our first playoff game.”
Kelseyville coach Lou Poloni said the Knights should be just fine against St. Joesph Notre Dame as long as their “A team” shows up.
“We don”t need the B team or the C team,” Poloni said. “They play in a pretty tough league and they”ve got some speed and power, so our intention is to bring our A team and win the game.”
The 2010 season has been a roller coast rider for the Knights, who have been up and down, sometimes from game to game.
“As much as we”ve been through it this might be our time to do something great,” Poloni said.
For senior Steven Grossner, a three-sport star for the Knights, it will be his first trip to the postseason in any sport.
“He”s experiencing the playoffs for the first time and he”s pretty excited about it,” Poloni said. “He”s worked hard for this.”
On Wednesday, the No. 11 Clear Lake baseball team plays No. 6 Berean Christian (13-10) of Walnut Creek in a first-round game at Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill at 5 p.m., and the No. 8 Upper Lake softball team squares off with No. 9 Fremont Christian (11-10) at 5 p.m. at Fremont Christian High School.
Try as she might, Upper Lake coach Kelly Coburn, now in her third season at Upper Lake, said she couldn”t find out much about Fremont Christian.
“I was on the Internet for four hours and didn”t see much,” Coburn said. “Another coach did tell me they have a pitcher who throws the ball slow and against the slow pitchers we can usually hit pretty well,” she said.
Coburn is hoping for one thing ? a rainout ? because if the Cougars play on Wednesday as scheduled they will be without starting catcher Rebecca Swaney, who has a band concert that she can”t get out of. “It”s 50 percent of her grade,” Coburn said, “so I”m praying for rain.”
Swaney said the long ride to Fremont is another concern.
“It”s a long trip,” she added.
The Clear Lake softball team, seeded No. 2, has a first-round bye and will meet either No. 10 Healdsburg (11-13) or No. 7 Fort Bragg (16-7) in the quarterfinals on Saturday at 2 p.m. in Lakeport. Healdsburg and Fort Bragg play Wednesday in Fort Bragg at 5 p.m. The Cardinals did not play Healdsburg in the preseason but do own a 17-7 NCL I interlock victory over Fort Bragg. Clear Lake has reached the Division IV championship game twice in the last three seasons, beating St. Patrick/St. Vincent of Vallejo in 2007 and losing to the same team last year. St. Patrick/St. Vincent (22-2) is once again the No. 1 seed in Division IV, followed by Clear Lake, Berean Christian (15-7), Cloverdale (17-4), Justin-Siena (15-9) and St. Mary”s (15-8).
Cloverdale and Just-in-Siena both received first-round byes and will square off in the quarterfinals Saturday at 4 p.m. in Cloverdale.
The top seeds in Division IV baseball are St. Patrick/St. Vincent (14-6-1), St. Mary”s (17-7), Justin-Siena (15-8), St. Joseph Notre Dame, Marin Catholic and Berean Christian.
In Division V softball, College Prep (19-0) is the No. 1 seed and St. Bernard (Eureka) is No. 2 at 21-2.
The Upper Lake-Fre-mont Christian winner plays College Prep in the quarterfinals Saturday at 2 p.m. at Fielding Field in Berkeley.
