Benefield: Top seed Casa Grande heats up at the right time

The Casa Grande Gauchos are the No. 1 seed in the loaded North Coast Section Division 2 baseball tournament. Who would have thought it after Casa dropped its first two league games this season?

The Gauchos, loaded with talent but who start just two seniors, have been perhaps the biggest enigma of any Empire team this season.

After a strong preseason, the Gauchos dropped a surprising four games in North Bay League, including their first two games, to finish second to a strong Maria Carrillo squad. But they also beat Carrillo the last two times the teams met, including a 13-5 win on Friday to take the NBL tournament.

Gauchos coach Paul Maytorena thinks his group is solving the puzzle at just the right time.

“We’ve had some adversity,” he said. “They have short memories.”

“In the past, where we have won NCS, it is if you are hot at the end,” Maytorena said.

“We took a few to the teeth those first two games,” he said. “We compartmentalized. We made such short goals.”

New goal?

Win the NCS Division 2 tournament.

“Our big thing is NCS,” he said. “Of course we wanted to win league.”

The Gauchos’ tournament win, along with its 2-1 record against Carrillo and its strong preseason, clearly impressed the NCS seeding committee.

The Gauchos beat No. 2 seed Redwood 6-2 on Feb. 24 and No. 3 seed Marin Catholic 6-2 on March 7.

Maria Carrillo received the No. 4 seed, Petaluma is No. 6, Ukiah is No. 8, Montgomery is No. 11 and Rancho Cotate is No. 16.

“We played really well in the nonleague season,” Maytorena said.

“If we can get our bats hot, I knew we could do something special,” he said.

No bat has been hotter than junior Spencer Torkelson’s.

Torkelson is hitting .444 with 24 RBIs and two homers.

“He’s been really consistent all year,” he said.

Quinton Gago didn’t start the season with the rest of the Gauchos after he suffered a broken clavicle in football. But the junior has come on strong at the plate, batting cleanup and hitting .386.

Lead-off hitter Stephen Proctor is hitting .319 but it’s in center field that he’s making his mark, according to Maytorena.

“He’s just a wizard in the outfield,” he said. “He’s saved many runs.”

He’s joined in the outfield by Blake Berry, a senior who was an all-league infielder last season but was asked to take over left field this year.

“He didn’t think twice, ‘Whatever is best for the team,’?” Maytorena said.

That’s been part of the formula for the Gauchos, he said.

Chemistry.

And short memories.

When the Gauchos have been on the hard end of losses, they’ve filed them away as lessons and moved on, he said.

“To lose that tough one to Carrillo in the seventh and back it up to lose to Montgomery? That took a little ‘You win some, you learn some,’?” he said.

“We persevered,” he said.

And Maytorena said his fierce preseason schedule and the highly competitive North Bay League race has honed the Gauchos’ game at just the right time.

“We schedule pretty heavy and we take our lumps in February or March,” he said. “

He complimented Carrillo’s consistency, game in, game out for producing the best record in the league.

“I think they are the most consistent, the most complete,” he said. “On any given day we can do big things, but .?.?. they play the most consistent baseball.”

Maytorena is quick to say that the top seed “doesn’t mean anything.”

It’s a one-and-done tournament so any team, even the No. 1 seed, is one bad hop away from the end of the season.

“It’s a one-game tournament,” he said.

But that’s all the better for the Gauchos, who found the right time in the season to play up to their potential.

“It’s how to play great in May, our best baseball in May,” he said. “That’s all that matters.”

You can reach staff columnist Kerry Benefield at 526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com, on Twitter @benefield and on Instagram at kerry.benefield. Podcasting on iTunes “Overtime with Kerry Benefield.”