Junior Drew Rosenberg fired a one-hit shutout to lead the Lake Nona Lions to a 3-0 win over Osceola in the championship game of the Class 7A, District 6 baseball tournament.
Rosenberg, who went to 4-1 on the season while lowering his teamleading ERA to 0.87, was practically untouchable in allowing only a third inning bloop single to Danny Ramirez. He struck out eight, walked one and hit one batter in baffling hitters with a mixture of fastballs, hard sliders and breaking balls.
“You really just got to tip your hat to him.” Osceola Head Coach Scott Birchler said. “It didn’t happen very often but when we did hit the ball hard it was right at someone. Our starter (Shawn Lara) did not have his best stuff tonight but when you only get one hit, it really doesn’t matter.”
Osceola, which entered the game as the district’s top seed, did not put a runner in scoring position. Their best chance to score came in the fourth inning when Sebastion Burgos walked and two outs later Ramirez just missed a home run – flying out to the wall in left field.
Lara struggled in his 2.1 innings. He worked himself out of trouble in the first and second innings before being touched for three runs in the third. With two on and one out, Ryan Villman drilled a double off the centerfield wall to score Ed Romero and make it 1-0. Carlos Sanatana followed one batter later with a run scoring single to chase Lara from the game. Ramirez came on in relief and struck out Roberto Santana, but hit Alejandro De la Vega with the bases loaded on a 3-2 pitch to bring in a third run.
Martinez did not allow a run in four and two-thirds innings of work, drawing praise from Birchler.
“He did what we needed him to do by not allowing any more runs to score, unfortunately we simply could not get our bats going,” he said.
The loss dropped Osceola to 18-7 on the season. As district runnerup, the Kowboys will now have to travel to Dr. Phillips on Friday, where they will face the District 5 champion Panthers (17-8) in a regional quarterfinal. Lake Nona will host District 5 runner-up Olympia.
“This time of the year, all your opponents are going to be good,” Birchler said about the upcoming matchup with Dr. Phillips. “Obviously winning the district and getting a home game would have been ideal, but I am optimistic we will regroup and play well.”
Should both Lake Nona and Osceola win next week, the two teams would meet again in a May 12 regional semifinal.
