La Costa Canyon draws state’s top team in first round of baseball regionals; other pairings announced

Congratulations La Costa Canyon High School.

The reward for winning the CIF San Diego Section Open Division baseball championship is a Southern California Regional playoff game Tuesday against Sherman Oaks Notre Dame (28-3) — ranked No. 19 in the nation and No. 1 in California by MaxPreps.

“At least we’re playing at home,” said La Costa Canyon coach Justin Machado.

La Costa Canyon (24-6) is good, too, ranked No. 7 in California and seeded No. 2 in the regionals after beating Eastlake 5-2 on Friday before a full house at San Diego State’s Tony Gwynn Stadium.

Notre Dame lost in the Southern Section Division 1 quarterfinals on May 15 to Corona — 2-1 in 10 innings.

So how does Notre Dame get in?

Opt outs.

Southern Section Division 1 champion San Juan Capistrano JSerra has already graduated and opted out of the regionals.

So did Alison Niguel and Yorba Linda.

The committee that seeds the regionals doesn’t like to give byes, so Notre Dame was extended an invitation and accepted.

“It’s kind of weird, but it should be fun,” Machado said. “They have a number of great players, pitchers with big arms. But they have a long bus ride, and they’ll be out of their routine.”

Notre Dame has seven college scholarship players — pitchers Oliver Boone (Cal), Justin Lee (UCLA) and Sammy Petroccelli (Stanford), infielders Madden Ocko (Fordham) and Levi Sterling (Texas) and outfielders Dean West (UCLA) and Ryan Limerick (Cal).

Lee has a 1.06 ERA with 98 strikeouts in 66 innings.

“We’ll have all we can handle,” Machado said. “All we can do is go out and play. Who knows what will happen? If we play good defense, get some timely hits, who knows?”

La Costa Canyon has its own stable of college-bound players.

Pitcher Stunner Gonzalez is headed to LSU, pitcher/first baseman Gabe Camacho is going to Pacific, catcher Kalen Applefield is committed to Cal, reliever Cooper Walls is headed to Hawaii, center fielder James Theodore is going to Webster (St. Louis) and left-hander Caden Pearlman, who figures to be the starting pitcher Tuesday, is sifting through college offers.

Rancho Bernardo and Eastlake join La Costa Canyon in the Division 1 Regionals. Eastlake is seeded third and is at home against Orange Lutheran.

Rancho Bernardo is seeded No. 5 and is at Corona.

“I don’t know what to make of the opt outs,” said RB coach Jeff Baumbeck, who coached at Redondo Union in the Southern Section before coming to RB.

“I get it, school is over and it’s hard to practice for 10 days, keep kids motivated. Maybe the Southern Section needs to look at its schedule.”

Santana, San Diego Section’s Division 1 champion, has a home game against San Bernardino Aquinas.

Sage Creek and Fallbrook — two of the feel-good stories in the San Diego Section playoffs — are in Division 4 for the Regionals.

Sage Creek, which was seeded No. 12, played seven playoff games — all on the road — winning Division 2 in San Diego. The Bobcats are seeded No. 3 and will play No. 6 Apple Valley.

“We were hoping for a home game,” said Sage Creek coach Ryan Madsen.

Fallbrook won San Diego’s Division 3 title — the school’s first baseball championship in 100 years. The Warriors are seeded No. 4 and host Rolling Hills Estates Peninsula.

Softball saw Garden Grove Pacific and Norco opt out of the regionals.

Those schools, however, were not replaced, so softball has byes in all five divisions.

Poway, San Diego’s Open Division champion, and Otay Ranch, the San Diego Section Division 1 winner, received byes as the No. 1 seed as did Poway in Division 1 and Otay Ranch in Division 3.

Rancho Bernardo in Division 1, El Capitan and Carlsbad in Division 2, Mater Dei Catholic in Division 3, Holtville in Division 4 and Madison and Coastal Academy in Division 5, received home games.