Malibu baseball wins San Diego tournament

The Malibu High baseball team unleashed an offensive fury in a 14-0 win over High Tech High of San Diego on Thursday, the second win of the day, to take home the San Diego Lions Spring Break Classic tournament championship.

Earlier in the day, pitchers Riley McMillin, a senior, and Chase Lambert, a junior, teamed up to hurl a shutout against Sweetwater High in a 3-0 win to advance to the title game.

McMillin went 5.2 innings and gave up just three hits before Lambert took over to strike out the game’s last four batters and earn a save. Lambert has now struck out 41 hitters in 17.1 innings of work this year.

The Sharks got all the offense they would need from sophomore Bronson Bard, who opened the scoring in the first against Sweetwater with a hard RBI single to left field. Bard ended up 9-17 with seven RBI in the tournament.  

Senior Alvaro “Alvie” Alvarado continued his great tournment by singling and scoring another Sharks run on an RBI by Lambert. Alvarado went 9 for 18 with six doubles, six RBI, five runs scored and three stolen bases in the tournament.

Lambert also scorerd another Sharks run in a sacrifice fly by sophomore Austin George, making it a 3-0 final.

Then, it was on to the main event, which featured another Sharks shutout to earn the tournament championship.

Junior Noah Simon pitched three solid innings before handing the ball over to junior Miles Tade, who pitched the final three shutout innings and secured the championship.

Simon moves to 5-0 on the year and Tade had his second impressive outing of the tournament. Malibu put up 14 runs behind multi-hit games from Lambert, George and freshman Ezra Allen. Bard was also 1-2 with three walks and a hit-by-pitch.

Another highlight was freshman Tim Thomas’ sharp single to center, his first hit of his varsity career. Thomas was pinch-hitting for his brother, senior captain Frank Thomas V.

Lambert continued his impressive junior campaign by earning the 2013 Lions tournament MVP. Lambert went 1-0 with one save and struck out 14 in 5.1 innings of relief work. Lambert also went 13 for 22 with six RBI, six runs scored and six stoles bases in the tournment, including a 5-5 game against Morse High earlier this week.

By going 5-0 in San Diego, the Sharks pushed their record to 14-1, the hottest start in school history. 

Next up for Malibu is Division-I powerhouse Santa Monica High, set for Friday, April 5 at Malibu High.

The Sharks then finish the regular season with 10 crucial conference games leading up to the CIF playoffs.