De La Salle of Concord baseball players are shown after they collected the school’s third CIF NorCal D1 title in the past three years. Photo: Mark Tennis.
A baseball team scoring three times in the bottom of the seventh inning to win a major title like the CIF NorCal D1 championship is pretty incredible, but compared to the other two times that the De La Salle of Concord baseball team rallied to win NorCal titles in the last four years what happened on Saturday at their home diamond actually wasn’t that dramatic. The Spartans topped Serra of San Mateo and will finish no lower than third in this year’s final state rankings.
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In the first-ever CIF NorCal D1 baseball championship played in 2022 at De La Salle of Concord, the host Spartans trailed St. Francis of Mountain View, 6-3, heading into the bottom of the seventh inning. Errors and walks helped load the bases and then with the score 6-5 a high chopper hit by Ethan Dungo got through the defense for a two-run single that won the game 7-6.
One year later in the CIF NorCal final it was the Spartans who were the road team playing at Valley Christian of San Jose. The host Warriors had an 8-5 lead entering the top the seventh, but one single, walks and hit batters helped two runs come in. De La Salle was still behind 8-7 and was down to its last strike with two outs when Hank Tripaldi came through with a grand slam homer that made it 11-8. A possible three-run homer by Valley Christian in the bottom of the seventh was caught in deep center field and the Spartans held on for a 11-8 win. Hank’s mother had died of cancer just a few weeks before, which made his grand slam all the more dramatic.
Tyler Spangler (left) had two RBI doubles and Brandon Vargas (right) had a sac fly and saved a run with a tag at the plate during De La Salle’s win vs Serra. Photo: Mark Tennis.
Fast forward to Saturday’s CIF NorCal D1 title game played at De La Salle (on a different, new field than before since the previous one was natural grass and dirt) and it was again a high chopper, this time hit by Niko Baumgartner that he was able to beat out for a walk-off infield hit and game-winning RBI in a 5-4 win by the Spartans against Serra of San Mateo. They were never down to their last strike like 2023, but the magic was again undeniable.
Instead of being behind 6-3, the Spartans were behind Serra “only” 4-2 heading into the bottom of the seventh. After the first out was earned on a grounder, a tough play on the infield that was ruled an error put Ethan Sullivan at first base. The next batter, highly regarded junior shortshop Tyler Spangler, roped a double down the left field line that scored Sullivan.
Antonio Castro was up next and smacked a hard grounder down the right field line that also went for an RBI double that scored Spangler to tie the score. After a walk and then a ground out put runners and second and third with two outs, Baumgartner hit a high chopper on the infield. The ball stayed in the air just long enough for Baumgartner to race toward first base. There was no other play for Serra shortstop Ian Josephson to make but to try for the out at first. The throw was off line, but may not have mattered as Baumgartner already was at the bag. Castro had scored the winning run.
De La Salle ended a 29-4 season and won its third CIF NorCal regional baseball title in the four years that the event has been held. One difference between 2021 and 2025, however, is that after that title there was not a CIF SoCal regional champion that also had won the CIF Southern Section D1 title. This year, St. John Bosco of Bellflower (30-4) won the SoCal regional title on Saturday after winning the CIFSS D1 title (and beat national powerhouse Corona in the semifinals). It is going to be State Team of the Year unlike 2021 when DLS was able to rise all the way to top due to differing SoCal title outcomes.
“We got back to the basics in that inning,” said De La Salle head coach David Jeans, the 2023 State Coach of the Year and therefore ineligible to be given the nod again. “We were going the other way early in the game and started doing that again. They made a mistake to Castro and he was able to take advantage.”
Jeans was asked about winning three titles in four years and just wanted to focus on this year’s seniors.
“It’s just a great group of guys and I feel great for those guys,” he said. “The senior class has already graduated and you saw so many of them out here pulling for all of the other senior players.”
Serra looked like it was in good shape to win its first-ever CIF NorCal title after winning its first CIF Central Coast Section D1 title last week with a 3-2 win over Valley Christian of San Jose. But head coach Mat Keplinger told his coaches as the final inning started that he knew it was not going to be easy.
“We knew they are a quality opponent and as talented as anybody out there,” said Keplinger, whose team finished 28-7 and was No. 11 in the Cal-Hi Sports State TOP 35. “I’m still so proud of this group. They are going to go down as one of the better teams in Serra history. I tried to take a moment for them to reflect on that.”
Similar to the CCS final against Valley Christian, early batters for the Spartans had great contact against Serra starting pitcher Riley Lim. The first two, Sullivan and Spangler, smacked doubles for a quick 1-0 lead. Castro then singled, but a strikeout and sacrifice fly by Brandon Vargas meant only one more run.
Serra, which had three hard-hit balls in the top of the first, mounted a two-out rally in the top of the third. Josephson and Evan Bradshaw both singled and then it was Davis Minton splitting the outfield with a double that brought home both runs. In the Valley Christian game, it was Aaron Minton, the sophomore younger brother of Davis, who had a two-run double that turned out to be the big hit of that game.
Niko Baumgartner is greeted in the outfield by teammate Alec Blair (far left) and others after he beat out an infield chopper that resulted in a walk-off win for De La Salle in the CIF NorCal final. Photo: Mark Tennis.
As Lim began to settle down and keep DLS batters off-balance, the Padres took a 3-2 lead in the top of the fourth. A throwing error and a sacrifice bunt set it up for Aaron Meier to hit an RBI single up the middle. DLS starting pitcher Roman Bartosh did get a huge out to end the inning with a strikeout of Josephson with two runners on.
The Spartans left the bases loaded in the fifth and were retired in the sixth as Davis Minton had come into pitch for Lim. Jack Sydlik had a 1-2-3 inning for De La Salle as the pitcher in the top of the fifth and struck out two in the sixth.
Serra extended its lead to 4-2 in the top of the seventh. A single by William Walbridge with one out started it off. There was a hit batter and then Bradshaw came through for his third hit of the game with a double that scored pinch-runner Jack Russell. Davis Minton had a chance for more but hit a catchable fly ball to right. Baumgartner, who would later get the game-winning RBI, was in place and knew that Bradshaw was going to try to score on a sac fly. He wheeled a strong, accurate throw to the plate where Vargas applied the tag.
“The coaches just said ‘Relax and do what you do,'” said Baumgartner of the final inning. “I was just glad to have kept the score close by saving that one run.”
The senior completed a memorable year as a football-baseball dual sport athlete at De La Salle that included impressive performances at linebacker in the team’s win in London, in the team’s win over Pittsburg in the CIF North Coast Section D1 final and in the CIF Open Division state title game loss to Mater Dei of Santa Ana.
“I’m not going to lie but this was my tops moment,” said Baumgartner, who will play football next at Fresno State. “It’s hard to beat to get a walk-off win in the last baseball game.”
In two years, the CIF is likely going to have a CIF state championship for baseball in which the north champion and south champion would be playing. At that point, and when the calendar is aligned throughout the state and likely moved up at least one week, there would be a game that what would have happened this year between De La Salle and St. John Bosco. At that point, we also would not expect to see the large number of teams from the CIF Southern Section (including Corona this year and last) opting out of the regionals, either.
“It would be great and the more games we’d get to play with these guys the better,” said Jeans, who returns almost all of the team’s top pitchers next season. “It will be great not just for our team but will be great for the sport in all of California.”
Mark Tennis is the co-founder and publisher of CalHiSports.com. He can be reached at markjtennis@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow Mark on the Cal-Hi Sports Twitter handle: @CalHiSports
