BACK TO BACK TO BACK: La Verne 11-Year-Old All Stars Launch Their Own Fireworks Show

In the first inning, La Verne homered in three consecutive bats, with balls hit by rom left, A.J. Woodall, Jr., Anthony Cascarano and Nate Schneider each leaving the yard.

After their offensive display in the first inning against Pomona Southwest, maybe 11-Year-Old All Stars Anthony Cascarano, A.J. Woodall, Jr. and Nathan Schneider need to be playing not for La Verne, but for UCLA, which is now playing in the College World Series and could use the extra muscle.

The trio went back to back to back, slamming home runs that rattled trees and sent squirrels running for cover. After their three consecutive blasts in the first inning, La Verne cruised to a 9-2 victory.

The bottom half of the inning started harmlessly enough. Nick Peifer beat out an infield single to lead off. After Kenji Henderson struck out, Cascarano hit a two-run homer to right that left the ballpark in a hurry. Woodall followed with a blast of his own, once again getting the teammates of the bench for a celebration at home plate. Just as everyone was settling back into their seats, Schneider, catching the home run contagion, hit a solo shot that cleared the centerfield fence.

In the second, La Verne responded with five more runs. In the inning, Andrew Berdugo singled, Peifer got aboard on an error, Henderson walked and Cascarano singled. After a couple of fly-outs by Woodall and Schneider, Johnson walked and Jake San Miguel got aboard via an error by the right fielder, sending two more runners home.

Meanwhile, on the mound Cascarano was masterful. He was followed by Graydon Smith, who also looked sharp by keeping batters off balance with his slow curve. Nick Johnson finished up for La Verne.

In fact, the biggest problem for La Verne, at least on this night, was getting all the subs in. So instead of more batters taking big-time hacks to add to the team’s home run total, La Verne started playing little ball. Even the sluggers on the team were asked to literally sacrifice for the team.

Pomona scratched out a couple of runs late, but it would not be enough to overcome La Verne’s early firewords.

In La Verne’s Saturday opener, Cascarano had struggled on the mound, but he was a different pitcher on Monday, rewarding the team’s confidence in him.

“I had full confidence in him, and that goes for all of our pitchers,” said Manager Kevin Smith. “There’s literally 10 guys on this team that I can give the ball to and feel comfortable with.”

Again, Smith’s biggest problem was getting all of his players into the game, per Little League rules that say every player must bat once and play three outs on defense.

As a result, Smith went to the bunt offense.

“You never want to play like that, but we had to slow the game just so that everybody could bat,” Smith said.

Either way, hitting home runs or dropping down bunts, La Verne looks like the team to beat in the tournament.

“Everybody who bunted did a good job, so it was good practice,” Smith added.

La Verne returns to Marchant Park on Wednesday at 5:30 p.m.

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