Baseball Preview: West Hills Wolf Pack vs. Valhalla Norsemen
West Hills and Valhalla are an even 5-5 against one another since May of 2021, but likely not for long. The West Hills Wolf Pack will head out on the road to face off against the Valhalla Norsemen at 4:00 p.m. on Friday. Both teams are coming into the contest red-hot, with West Hills sitting on four straight victories and Valhalla on seven.
West Hills is headed into the matchup fresh off scoring the most runs they have all season. Their pitchers stepped up to hand El Cajon Valley a 16-0 shutout on Thursday. The team's explosion at the plate also rewarded West Hills with their most commanding win of the season.
West Hills got a great performance from J Howard as he didn't allow a single earned run and only two hits while striking out eight over 5.1 innings pitched.
At the plate, the team relied heavily on B Steveson, who went 3-for-4 with a home run, five RBI, and three runs. Another player making a difference was C Lewis, who scored three runs and stole a base while getting on base in three of his five plate appearances.
Meanwhile, Valhalla put their dominant pitcher on display in the team's third consecutive shutout on Thursday. They came out on top against El Capitan by a score of 3-0.
The team relied heavily on Julian Jerjees, who went 2-for-3 with a home run and two RBI. Mace Wheeler was another key contributor, scoring a run while going 2-for-2.
West Hills' win bumped their record up to 9-11. As for Valhalla, their victory was their fourth straight at home, which pushed their record up to 14-6.
The batters for both teams will have to hit smart on Friday as both have some strikeout artists on the roster. West Hills has been retiring batters left and right this season, having averaged 7.8 strikeouts per game. However, it's not like Valhalla struggles in that department as they've been averaging 6.8. Considering how easily both teams rack up Ks, the hitters on both teams better bring their A-game into this one.
West Hills came up short against Valhalla in their previous meeting on April 3rd, falling 6-3. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Valhalla's Mathew Ibrahim, who struck out six batters over six innings while giving up just two earned runs off four hits. Now that West Hills knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
