No decision in SV showdown game at press time

North Central League II baseball, already with more drama than a Kardashian family wedding reception, went totally crazy Friday evening/night.

First the fact. The showdown game between the NCL II’s two league unbeaten teams isn’t over as this is being written. It should be by the time you read this. The game was postponed by darkness tied 12-12 after five innings. The game was to be finished Wednesday evening beginning at 5:30 p.m. back at Doyle Park in Santa Rosa where it all began. That continuation came too late for this week’s edition of the Argus. See Petaluma 360 for final game recap.

Doyle Park is fully equipped with lights. but no one seemed to know how to operate the illumination system when darkness hit. After a 45-minute wait, it was decided to play again another day.

That decision left in limbo the outcome of a wild game that was an extremely different contest than was expected.

As the battle opened, Sonoma Academy was working on a state-record six consecutive no-hit streak. St. Vincent had recently had a four-game no-hitter streak of its own snapped. It all figured to add up to a tight pitchers’ duel between staff aces Liam Galten for St. Vincent and Dylan De La Montayna for Sonoma Academy.

Wrong!

Galten emphatically ended the Coyotes’ no-hitter streak in the first inning. bombing a monster double to the base of the left-center field fence, some 350 feet from home plate to score teammates David Sammon and Bradley Leach, both of who had coaxed walks off De La Montanya.

Before darkness finished the bombing, St. Vincent had seven more hits.

Three of those came in the top of the third inning when a whole collection of wildness, including two walks and two Sonoma Academy errors added up to seven more runs for the Mustangs. Galten, Reilly Tobin and a bases-clearing triple by Mike Davis delivered the hits.

Meanwhile, Galten gave up a run on an error in the first inning, but generally sailed through the first two frames.

The Coyote bats came alive in the third inning for three hits and three runs, but when an error and Trevor Bovaird’s two-run double down the left field line gave the Mustangs three more runs and a 12-4 lead, St. Vincent seemed well on its way to the top of the standings. That rally was started by a monster double off the left-field fence by Dom Petersen that carried even father than Galten’s first-inning blast.

But, a sad thing happened to the Mustangs on their way to a blowout - the Coyotes started hitting. Four Coyote runs scored in the fourth before Boviar finally brought relief by getting the final two outs.

Sonoma Academy kept on hitting in the fifth. After an initial out, five straight Coyote batters reached base. Before Bradley Leach could get the final out, everybody had 12 runs and both teams looked for light from above.

It never happened and, until last night, each team still had 12 runs.