July 28, 2017 Compton, CA The Orange County Riptide and the Healdsburg Prune Packers won their first-round games at the CCL Playoffs today at the MLB Youth Academy and will meet tomorrow at 2pm with the winner going directly to the championship game Sunday and the loser having to face an elimination game at 6pm Saturday before being able to advance. Tate Shaw (Texas) hit a solo home run to lead off the seventh inning that proved to be the winning margin, Parker Joe Robinson (Texas) kept his scoreless pitching summer going, stranding two runners in scoring position in the sixth and Caleb Kilian (Texas Tech) struck out four over the final three innings to close out a 5-4 win for the Riptide over the Neptune Beach Pearl in the early game today. The Riptide scored two runs in their first at bat to take the early lead when Joey Parente led off by reaching on a two-base error, advanced to third on a Beau Phllip (Lewis & Clark) single and scored on a Dominic Fletcher (Arkansas) single for the first run, and Phillip, after stealing second base and advancing to third on Fletcher’s single, scored on an RBI-groundout by Logan Pouelsen (Hawaii) for the second run. Orange County starting pitcher Hayden Shenefield retired the first six batters he faced in order, two on the bases via a fielder’s choice and a caught stealing, before Andrew Rosa (Oklahoma St) hit a solo home run to lead off the third inning and make the score 2-1. Rosa led off the fifth inning with a single and scored when David Kyriacou (Kansas) hit a ball over the right-field wall to give the Pearl a 3-2 lead, but the lead was brief as the Riptide scored two of their own in the bottom half of the inning when Cooper Uhl (LMU) walked, Paul Gomez singled, both runners advanced on an infield ground out, Uhl scored on an RBI-ground out by Phillip and Gomez scored on a passed ball. A one-out single by Tim Lichty (Texas A&M) prompted Riptide manager Tyger Pederson to bring Robinson into the game to relieve Shenefield and, after recording the second out, Robinson gave up a double to Rosa, his third hit of the game, to put two runners in scoring position. Robinson struck out the next batter to increase his scoreless inning streak this summer to 16. Kilian then entered the game to pitch in the top of the seventh and, after retiring the side in order, got an important insurance run to work with when Shaw hit his home run. Kilian then retired the side in order in the eighth inning and struck out the first two batters of the ninth before Kyriacou, Jacob Chappell (Oklahoma St) and Harrison Moore, who also had three hits in the game, hit three consecutive two-out singles to get score one and get within one, but Kilian got a fly-ball for the final out of the game. Kevin Stone (Harvard) started on the mound for Neptune Beach, striking out four in seven innings of work and suffered the loss. Click here for a boxscore of this game Chase Gardner (UConn) struck out nine over six innings, Bryce Nagata (Sonoma St), Jamey Smart (LMU) and Brett Bautista (San Jose St) each had three hits and the Healdsburg offense scored six runs in the first two innings en route to beating the Conejo Oaks 9-5 in the second game of the playoffs today. Gardner, who was the league’s showcase starter in the CCL All-Star game earlier this month, set the tempo of how the game would go for Conejo in the first inning, fielding a bunt for a one-pitch out and then striking out the next two batters. Then the Healdsburg offense set its own tempo in the bottom half of the inning when Nagata led off with a triple, Smart, the league’s RBI-leader, drove Nagata home with a single, and Bautista hit an RBI-triple to give Healdsburg a 2-0 lead. Gardner struck out two more in a scoreless top of the second inning and then Healdsburg pounced on the opportunity of two leadoff walks in the bottom half, scoring four runs on RBI-singles by Nagata and Smart and sacrifice flies by Grant Little (Texas Tech) and Bautista. Gardner held the Oaks scoreless until one out in the fourth inning, when a walk and a reached-on-error put two runners on in front of a DJ Miller (Ole Miss) double and, after an RBI-ground out plated a second run for the Oaks, Gardner finished through the sixth without any further trouble. The Oaks did make a run late, scoring three runs in the seventh inning on a sacrifice fly by Milo Beam (Purdue) and RBI-doubles by Max Winstein (Cal Lutheran) and Brandon Lewis (LA Pierce College), but that was all they would get off Nolan Bond (Houston), who came in to pitch in relief of Gardner in the seventh and went on to retire the side in order in the final two innings. Click here for the boxscore of this game Healdsburg and Orange County will meet in the Winners Game tomorrow at 2pm. Conejo and Neptune Beach will meet in the first elimination game at 10am. The winner of the 10am game and the loser of the 2pm will meet in the second elimination game Saturday at 6pm. Go to the CCL Playoffs Info Center for the complete playoffs schedule and details about how to watch the games live online.