{"id":79967,"date":"2025-06-05T00:32:14","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T00:32:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/79967\/"},"modified":"2025-06-05T00:32:14","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T00:32:14","slug":"west-valley-baseball-tops-arcata-in-norcal-semi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/79967\/","title":{"rendered":"West Valley baseball tops Arcata in NorCal semi"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andrew Edwards\/Special to the Record Searchlight
\n\u00a0|\u00a0 Redding Record Searchlight<\/p>\n

West Valley baseball\u2019s storied season added another wrinkle in the first round of the Division IV CIF Northern California Regional playoffs Tuesday.<\/p>\n

On the brink of elimination after a pressure-filled game, senior Manny Sleezer delivered a tenth-inning walk-off in front of a home crowd to send West Valley past No. 7 seed Arcata, 9-8, and into the semifinal on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Junior Degan Palos also came through when it mattered most. After Arcata stunned the Eagles with a four-run seventh inning to take an 8-6 lead, West Valley had three outs to save its season. Palos drove in the tying run, senior Gabe Lyman, and extended the game.<\/p>\n

The Eagles hadn\u2019t found themselves in this type of game this season, but were able to meet the moment. Tuesday marked their first extra-inning game of the 2025 campaign and was just the second time they\u2019d ended a game with a one-score win this season, boasting a 9.2 run margin of victory entering NorCals.<\/p>\n

More: See which Redding-area baseball and softball teams will play in the NorCal playoffs<\/a><\/p>\n

West Valley\u2019s 14-hit total counted as a postseason high and was its 13th double-digit hit game of a now 23-win season. Every player who had an at-bat Tuesday recorded at least one hit for the Eagles, including Palos, sophomore Gunner Church and senior Tait Brimhall, who each had two or more.<\/p>\n

Santa Clara, the No. 3 seed, will travel to Cottonwood to take on West Valley at 4 p.m. Thursday after its first-round 10-9 victory over No. 6 seed Oakland Tech, which also ended with a walk-off. The winner will face either top-seeded Woodland Christian on the road or No. 5 seed Menlo School at home in the Division IV championship at 4 p.m. on Saturday.<\/p>\n

West Valley\u2019s next test is its biggest to date and it poses a resume that rivals its own. Santa Clara is on a 19-game win streak, by far the best of any remaining NorCal playoff team across five divisions, and has rattled off a 28-win season. It is here after winning a Division IV Central Coast Section championship.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been decades since West Valley has enjoyed a season to this degree, and it\u2019s all happened under a first-year head coach in Willie Church. The club has won 21 of its last 22 games, and is knocking on the door of a NorCal championship, the highest honor for high school baseball as it does not hold a statewide playoff like most other prep sports.<\/p>\n

After Chico, Durham and Maxwell\u2019s first-round losses, West Valley is one of three Northern Section teams left standing in the NorCal playoffs. Top-seeded Etna and Los Molinos are set to face off in Division V on Thursday with a championship appearance on the line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andrew Edwards\/Special to the Record Searchlight \u00a0|\u00a0 Redding Record Searchlight West Valley baseball\u2019s storied season added another wrinkle…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79968,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2288],"tags":[5,1854,3263,2328,2304,4,2305,2303,1855,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-79967","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb-postseason","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-high","10":"tag-high-school-sports","11":"tag-major-league-baseball-playoffs","12":"tag-major-league-baseball-postseason","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-mlb-playoffs","15":"tag-mlb-postseason","16":"tag-school","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114627945833396852","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79967"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79967\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}