The good times keep rolling for the Malibu High baseball team. After sweeping Santa Clara last week in a home-and-home series, the Sharks won their 17th and 18th games of the season, setting a new school-record in the process for most wins in a season. The 2008 squad went 17-8. With six games remaining in the regular season, Malibu has a two-game lead over Santa Paula in the Frontier League standings for first place.
As of Tuesday, Malibu was 18-3 overall and 8-1 in league with Santa Paula residing in second at 6-3. The teams were slated to play a series this week with games at Santa Paula yesterday and at MHS on Friday at 3:30 p.m. The Sharks no-hit Santa Paula in a 5-1 victory on March 15.
“Our best season in school history is due to the commitment, work ethic and a team-first buy-in of the student athletes helping build our program,” Malibu coach Ari Jacobs said. “Everyone on our 13-man roster is contributing big at different moments and that’s how team sports should go.”
There is a lot of baseball left to be played over the course of the next six weeks. Sweeping Santa Clara and defeating the Saints three times in a season was a great achievement by Malibu. The Sharks won 4-1 and 4-3 last week after beating Santa Clara, 3-2, back on March 13.
Malibu, ranked No. 4 in CIF Southern Section Division VI, has relied on the superb hitting of shortstop Chase Lambert and the quality pitching of Noah Simon to maintain its level of excellence. But the emergence of three sophomores (Bronson Bard, Austin George and Andre Simoneau) and two freshmen (Ezra Allen and Dylan Ross) has solidified the Sharks as a serious contender to win their first league title since 2005 and the school’s first CIF title in baseball.
In game one of the two-game set against Santa Clara, Simon pitched a complete game, allowing only one run while striking out six and walking none. He is now 7-1 on the year and 4-0 with one save in league. Simon has a sparkling earned run average of 1.62 overall with 49 strikeouts and only three walks.
Lambert added three more hits to his season total of 37 and continues to bat at a .500 average.
George had three hits and two RBI’s in addition to some nice defensive plays at third base. Ross went 2-for-4 with a run scored and senior Riley McMillin had two hits as well.
In game two hosted at the friendly confines of Sharks Stadium, Malibu set the school record with its 18th win of the season behind the inspired efforts of Simoneau and Allen. Simoneau threw 4.2 innings, giving up two unearned runs while Allen picked up the win. Lambert closed the door on the Saints for his seventh save of the year. He now has 48 strikeouts in 22.1 innings of work with a 0.62 era.
Ross hit a two-run double and George added a game winning RBI double. McMillin had an RBI sacrifice fly after a well-executed sacrifice bunt from senior Frank Thomas.
Bard is batting .333 with a team-leading 19 RBI’s. George (.386) and Ross (.297) are having strong seasons as well. Allen and Simoneau have done a wonderful job on the mound with era’s of 1.58 and 1.89, respectively.
“Our three-game sweep of Santa Clara is indicative of how we’ve been playing all year,” Jacobs said. “We know our pitchers are not going to give up many runs, so we manufacture offense and play real solid defense. When we put all of that together with the ability to respond to adversity and fight ahead, we are tough to beat.”
Malibu has now completed three-game sweeps over league foes Fillmore and Santa Clara. The Sharks have series with Villanova Prep and Carpinteria remaining before the CIF playoffs begin.
