Huntington Beach in showdown with JSerra in the National High School Invitational baseball final
An Orange County baseball team again will be the champion of the prestigious National High School Invitational.
Huntington Beach (11-6) plays JSerra (9-6) in the tournament’s championship game Saturday at 1:30 p.m. PDT at the USA Baseball Training Complex in Cary, NC.
Orange County teams have won seven of the nine NHSI tournaments, with Huntington Beach winning it in 2016.
It was an all-Trinity League matchup in one of Friday’s semifinals. JSerra defeated Santa Margarita 4-1. Huntington Beach beat Bishop Gorman of Las Vegas 3-2 in the other semifinal.
JSerra scored all of its runs in the first inning. Charlie Caruso, a junior who is committed to Northwestern, was 2 for 3 and Cal-signed senior Dominic Smaldino drove in two runs.
CHAMPIONSHIP BOUND 🏆#NHSI23 pic.twitter.com/H31bjHYsmK
— USA Baseball Events (@USABEvents) March 31, 2023
Lions junior right-hander Matt Champion, an LSU commit, pitched a complete game. He gave up six hits while striking out four. Champion pitched a complete game in a 2-0 win over Santa Margarita on March 16.
Santa Margarita’s Logan de Groot had two hits. Eagles pitcher Brennan Bauer shut out JSerra for the final six innings.
Huntington Beach senior shortstop Dean Carpentier, a USC signee, was 4 for 4 against Bishop Gorman. Senior first baseman Ralphy Velazquez, an Arizona State signee, had a sacrifice fly for the Oilers. Senior pitcher Brad Grindlinger threw four scoreless innings.
Huntington Beach secures its spot in the #NHSI23 CHAMPIONSHIP‼️ pic.twitter.com/lhyiU71BMn
— USA Baseball Events (@USABEvents) March 31, 2023
Santa Margarita (14-3) will face Georgia’s Blessed Trinity (20-3) in a consolation matchup Saturday at 3 p.m. PDT.
Santa Margarita is No. 1 in the Orange County Top 25,while JSera is No. 5 and Huntington Beach is No. 7.
Both games for the Orange County teams Saturday will be streamed live on USABaseball.TV and @USABaseballTV on YouTube.
Huntington Beach, JSerra and Santa Margarita will play in the Boras Classic South tournament that begins April 11 at JSerra and Mater Dei.
