Mater Advances As Mediavilla Shuts Down Goleman

With a 6-foot-4, 225 pound frame, Michael Mediavilla isn’t going to shy away from too many things.

Certainly an early deficit didn’t faze the Mater Academy senior southpaw, who fired a complete game four-hitter to lead the Lions past Goleman 6-2, in a 6A regional quarterfinal on Thursday night in front of more than 300 fans who packed Paul Demi Mainieri Field at St. Thomas University.

Mater (16-8) will visit Miami Springs on May 6th in a regional semifinal.

After giving up three hits to the first five batters and watching Goleman take a 2-0 lead, Mediavilla settled down. The future Miami Hurricane retired the next 14 batters in a row and gave up just one more hit while delivering shutout ball the rest of the way.

“I just bared down,” said Mediavilla, who fanned five, walked two and allowed one earned run. “I found my fastball on the outside corner. I started hitting my corners. My curveball stayed up a little bit, but I started fixing it, and when I needed it the most, it fell down and I got a bunch of strikeouts and groundouts that I needed. My change-up was working; got me out of a 3-2 jam.”

Lions Manager Michael DiRosa was equally appreciative of the poise displayed by his ace.

“He just kept his composure and got into his own groove,” said DiRosa.

As a team, Mater eventually found its groove, too. The Lions shrugged off a couple first-inning errors and chipped away at the deficit.

A first inning single by Danny Reyes brought home Angel Ortiz, who eluded a tag at home plate and dove back to safely touch the plate for Mater’s first run.

Goleman (14-11) received five and one-third strong innings from sophomore starting pitcher Kevin Gomez, who allowed three runs on seven hits and a walk and recorded two strikeouts. Gomez had a five-pitch inning in the third and the Gators maintained the 2-1 lead until the fourth, when Mater tied it on a fielder’s choice by Michael Escarra.

The Lions took the lead for good in the fifth when Ortiz scored on a double play, after he led off with a first-pitch double into the right-center field gap. Ortiz, who hit two home runs against Goleman in a regular season game, notched two of Mater’s nine hits.

Mater finally earned some breathing room with three runs in the sixth, highlighted by a two-run single into shallow left off the end of the bat of Raul Frias, who was 2-for-4. Ortiz followed with an RBI single, his second hit of the game.

Lions sophomore second baseman Alex Rodriguez turned in the defensive gem of the night when he robbed Justin Barreneche of a base hit. Rodriguez extended his body to max as he dove to his left to snag a sharply smacked grounder and then quickly got up to make the throw.

“If we had SportsCenter here, that would be on SportsCenter,” said DiRosa. “He’s been making plays like that all year. He covers a lot of ground. He’s a great player.”

Goleman’s loss marked the final game for seniors Daniel Guerrero, Joshua Guia, Liam Lopez and Justin Rodriguez. Guerrero had an RBI double in the first inning, after a run-scoring double from junior Kevin Gomez. Gomez was 2-for-3.

“I’m extremely proud of my guys,” said Goleman Manager Jose Lopez. “They came out to fight today. They showed a good battle through six innings and then the game slipped through our hands.”

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