Making its first-ever Northern California State Regional tournament appearance, Yuba City High baseball entered as the No. 1 seed in Division II Tuesday to take on No. 8 Hollister, a team it has never played out of the Central Coast Section.

Honkers head coach Maury Castaneda called on his “1.5 ace” Ashton Decker to help silence the Haybalers and put together a 5-1 win over Hollister for the team’s 12th straight win to equal the 2009 team’s longest streak of the year – 2009 was Max Stassi’s last year in brown and gold, yet the Major Leaguer and World Series champion never experienced a state regional while at YC as California did not have it in place at that time.

Yuba City has had multiple MLB-caliber ballplayers during its tenure at Winship and Castaneda referenced a couple from the YC heyday following the Honkers’ latest triumph.

“I would love to have Chandler Eden right now; he would have been a state champion, national champion – those guys are just great,” Castaneda said. “The Eden family is awesome; they got one guy who could heave and one who could bang and run. I would love to have Cameron, too.” 

With the help of the Edens, Stassis and Rodriguez family at the helm over the course of the last two-and-a-half decades, Yuba City has totaled seven Sac-Joaquin Section titles and remains alive for its first NorCal title Thursday when the 29-5 Honkers resume their lengthy season at Winship Field against No. 5 Lodi (25-9) — a SJS power that shutout Casa Grande. 3-0 on Tuesday. First pitch is set for 4 p.m. at Winship Field (YCHS). 

YC eyes its 13th straight win and 16-1 mark since mid April.

“These are playground kids,” Castaneda said. “It has that flow; when school gets out we get to practice on Wednesday and get to play on Thursday.” 

Decker allowed one run over four hits and struck out four over 5.2 innings against the Haybalers (21-9). Offensively, YC jumped ahead 2-0 on a couple scoring doubles in the third off the bats of Eliaja Moncher and Brody Miller. Miller had a multi-hit game, drove home a pair and silenced Hollister in the seventh. 

Thursday will mark the D-II regional semifinals, while Saturday is the NorCal D-II final against the winner of the other half of the bracket. First pitch is scheduled for 4 p.m. both days unless altered with mutual consent of the schools.