The Harbor Teacher Monarchs will square off against the Marquez Gladiators at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday. Both teams come into the contest bolstered by wins in their previous matches.
Marquez is hoping to do on Thursday what King/Drew couldn't on Friday: put an end to Harbor Teacher's winning streak, which now stands at four games. Harbor Teacher walked away with a 5-1 win over King/Drew.
John Perea Jr spent all seven innings on the mound, and it's clear why: he surrendered only one earned run on seven hits. He has been nothing but reliable: he hasn't tossed less than five strikeouts in three consecutive pitching appearances.
At the plate, the team relied heavily on Ricky Garcia, who scored a run while going 2-for-3. Another player making a difference was Quentin Duran, who scored a run and stole a base while going 1-for-3.
Meanwhile, Marquez can now show off eight landslide victories after their most recent match on Thursday. They put the hurt on Maywood Academy with a sharp 15-1 victory. The win made it back-to-back victories for Marquez.
William Morales made a big impact while hitting and pitching. He didn't allow a single earned run while striking out 12 over five innings pitched. Morales was also stellar in the batter's box, scoring two runs and stealing two bases while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances.
In other batting news, Robert Cerna and Derek Vazquez did most of the damage at the plate: Cerna went 3-for-4 with two stolen bases, four RBI, and two doubles, while Vazquez went 2-for-3 with two stolen bases, three runs, and four RBI. Anthony Molina was another key contributor, scoring two runs and stealing two bases while going 2-for-4.
Harbor Teacher is on a roll lately: they've won six of their last seven games, which provided a nice bump to their 10-4 record this season. As for Marquez, their win bumped their record up to 12-7.
Thursday's matchup will be a test for both team's pitchers. Harbor Teacher hasn't had any issues making contact this season, having earned a batting average of .425. However, it's not like Marquez struggles in that department as they've averaged .372. With both teams so capable at the plate, fans should be ready for an impressive hitting performance.
Harbor Teacher came up short against Marquez when the teams last played back in March, falling 4-0. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Marquez's Marino Bikouvaris, who kept things locked down with no earned runs or hits while striking out eight over 6.2 innings pitched. Now that Harbor Teacher knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
