SANTA ROSA — Maybe it was a case of the Mondays. Either way, a 13-3 loss in five innings to the Sonoma Academy Coyotes wasn’t the way Upper Lake High School baseball coach Brian Milhaupt wanted to start a three-game week for the Cougars.
The North Central League II road loss snapped Upper Lake’s three-game winning streak in league play. The Cougars (5-3, 6-6) won’t have to wait long to play the Coyotes again since the two teams meet Wednesday in Upper Lake at 4 p.m. After that, the Cougars are back on the road Friday to play Credo.
“They came to play and we didn’t show up today,” Upper Lake coach Brian Milhaupt said. “They were hitting the ball right from the start.”
The Cougars struggled in all facets of the game – they had only four hits, made five errors, and walked or hit a total of nine Sonoma Academy batters.
“Whenever you have more errors than hits, that’s not good,” Milhaupt said. “We had some very untimely errors that cost us some runs and ultimately the game. It was a rough game all around.”
The Cougars were trailing 7-0 before they scored their first two runs in the top of the fourth inning. Desmond Mueller tripled home the first run and scored on a passed ball. The Coyotes (5-2, 7-4) came right back with four runs in the bottom half to go up 11-2.
Upper Lake’s final run came in the top of the fifth when Jonathon Thiessen singled, moved to second on a Diego Velasco single and to third on a passed ball before scoring on another passed ball.
Sonoma Academy made an out to open the bottom of the fifth but each of the next five batters reached base against reliever Benat Love, ending the game.
Armando Santos worked the first four innings on the mound and took the loss. He struck out two, walked two and hit five.
Russell Gordon Jr. had the other Upper Lake hit.
Looking ahead to Wednesday’s rematch with Sonoma Academy, Milhaupt said the Cougars need to be focused from the first pitch if they expect to compete with the Coyotes.
“Hopefully we’ll give them a better game and come away with a win this time,” he said.
