LAKEPORT >> Perfection eluded Clear Lake High School varsity baseball coach Zane Jensen and his Cardinals in 2015, but it wasn’t for lack of effort.
Clear Lake won all 24 of its regular-season games, including a 14-0 run through the heart of the North Central League I, and its first two postseason games before falling 7-3 to three-time defending section champion Head-Royce of Oakland in the North Coast Section Division V semifinals in early June.
A 26-1 record gives Jensen a 46-7 mark and two undisputed league titles in his last two years.
And that’s not bad no matter how you slice it.
Jensen, who just completed his fourth and most satisfying season with the Cardinals, is the Lake County Record-Bee Coach of the Year for boys’ sports during the recently completed 2014-15 high school sports season.
A senior-dominated Clear Lake lineup (11 of 15 on the roster were 12th-graders) overpowered its opposition most of the season. The Cardinals were loaded with pitching and hitting and Jensen made good use of both.
While Jensen takes winning and losing seriously, winning league titles and collecting playoff appearances aren’t his only goals.
“My goal … and I’ve told my guys … is to get them to the next level. I want to see them have the same opportunities that I did and play college baseball,” Jensen said.
A one-time Clear Lake High star himself, Jensen, 32, also played for Mendocino College in Ukiah and Masters College in Los Angeles.
Familiarity with the players on his 2015 squad made it a special season indeed, moreso because it was the last time he’ll coach the likes of players such as Cole Brodnansky — the North Central League I most valuable player and Clear Lake’s league leader in virtually every statistical category on offense.
“It’s a huge advantage,” Jensen said. “Some have been with me for three years, some for four. I know these guys … ”
While there weren’t many close calls for Clear Lake in its first 26 games this season, there were a couple of notable Cardinal comebacks. At the top of that list might be Clear Lake’s 8-4 win over St. Bernard of Eureka (the Division VI champion) in a non-league game at the Fort Bragg Tournament. The Cardinals trailed 4-3 going to the seventh inning and rallied for five runs.
Other close calls were a 3-2 league win in eight innings at Cloverdale, a 4-3 non-league victory over St. Patrick/St. Vincent, and a 12-11 league win against Middletown.
“We found different ways to win,” Jensen said. “We’ve had games in which we didn’t hit well, but we pitched better and played better defense.”
The Cardinals also had a pretty good bench, one that came at key moments during the season.
“We have guys who haven’t gotten a lot of playing time who could be starting for other teams,” Jensen said following a 12-3 win over Middletown that wrapped up the Cardinals’ perfect season of 24-0.
While the Cardinals’ ultimate goal was an undefeated season — they would have been the first county baseball team in the sectional playoff era to do so — Jensen said he couldn’t have been any prouder of his team’s effort.
“This team showed a lot of class and played hard,” Jensen said. “We were one game away (from playing in the championship game) and got ourselves in a good spot. I think that proves that there’s a lot of hope for public schools — that it’s still possible (to win a section title).”
Jensen was referring to the dominance of private schools in the sectional playoffs. Since the NCS moved to the Division I-VI format in 2009, private schools have won every year in both Division IV and V.
