Foothill’s Diez defeats Gators

Adam Candee

Friday, April 4, 2003 | 9:48 a.m.

Green Valley's Ryan Tabor brought out the radar guns, but strong arm of Foothill's Adam Diez dominated Thursday.

The Falcons' senior right-hander used a heavy fastball and a sharp curve to hold the Gators to two runs and six hits over 6 1/3 innings, striking out eight en route to a 5-2 victory to open division play in the competitive Southeast Division.

"We played well," Foothill coach Tom Crine said. "We played good defense, pitched well and hit the ball when we had to."

Josh Daneshforooz went 3-for-4 with two RBIs and a run for Foothill (14-1, 1-0), but Diez's mound performance keyed the victory.

"I just tried to get ahead of everybody," Diez said.

Diez consistenly attacked the Gators (11-5, 0-1) with first-pitch strikes. Only Tabor and Kyle Price did not strike out against Diez, who only got into trouble in the fifth inning.

Protecting a 3-0 lead, Diez allowed a leadoff single to Kyle Price and then a line-drive double to Josh Williams. Diez tossed a wild pitch to score Price. But he battled back to strike out cleanup hitter Jordan Parraz and Matt Brenner and got Brian Sizemore to fly out.

Diez gave way to John Ripley with one out in the seventh, and Ripley retired the final two batters for the save.

With about a dozen scouts watching him, Tabor struggled with his control, hitting three batters and walking two. The senior left-hander regularly fell behind in the count and Foothill displayed patience in waiting for good pitches to hit.

Crine credits that patience to Foothill's past experience of facing Tabor.

"(We) battle him," Crine said. "(We) make him try to throw a lot of pitches."

Tabor allowed five runs on eight hits in six innings. He struck out four.