Defense was the difference Friday night during a pitching duel between the Carson Capitols' Brian Cochran and the Danville (Calif.) Hoots' John Williams.
The Capitols gave up three errors in the fourth inning, and the Hoots capitalized with three runs to break up a scoreless contest en route to their 4-1 victory in the opener of a three-game summer baseball series at Carson High School.
The Hoots, California state American Legion champions in 1999, added another run in the fourth, then rode the combined two-hit pitching of Williams and Dane Dobrinich to win a game that took 2 hours, 10 minutes to play and saw no earned runs. Williams retired the first 14 batters he faced and allowed one run on two hits before departing in favor of Dobrinich with one out in the seventh.
"John threw well tonight," Hoots coach Don Johns said. "He got a little tired at the end; maybe I left him in too long, but he had only thrown 59 pitches going into the seventh."
Williams was part of a pitching rotation that helped Danville's Monte Vista High to the CIF North Coast Section finals before losing to De La Salle, 8-7.
"John had a fine season. He was an unknown and unseen, but he was 11-1," Johns said of the right-hander.
The Capitols got a strong outing from Brian Cochran, who allowed eight hits over six innings. The left-hander, from Fallon and Feather River College, struck out seven and walked none.
"Brian did a good job tonight," Capitols coach Ron McNutt said. "It was a good ballgame. Their pitcher was in complete control of us.
"We had some tough breaks, but tomorrow is a different day."
Tim Gilhooly doubled with one out to ignite Danville's fourth inning rally. After a dropped pop foul, Kevin Mangels lined an RBI single into left to give the Hoots a 1-0 lead. Two more infield errors and Ryan Lymangrover's bloop single over shortstop made it 3-0.
The Capitols scored their run in the seventh. Brian Kleidosty reached on an error to lead off the inning, Brett McMillan walked with one out and Joe Jacobitz drilled a single up the middle to score the run. Dobrinich came on to pitch at that point and rang up back-to-back strikeouts to end the game.
The two teams meet again today in a 5 p.m. doubleheader at Carson High's Ron McNutt Field.
