A career day from freshman sensation has the Half Moon Bay High baseball team in Central Coast Section Division III semifinals for the second time in three years.
Berghammer was 3 for 4 with two doubles and a career-high five RBIs to lead the Cougars to a 7-2 victory over Soquel at Washington Park in Santa Clara on Saturday.
Fifth-seeded Half Moon Bay (23-6) will play No. 8 seed Santa Cruz (14-14) in a semifinal on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at San Jose Municipal Stadium.
Not bad for a team that’s coming out of the supposedly lower-level Peninsula Athletic League Ocean Division.
“I think we’ve proven that we’re definitely a good team,” said Half Moon Bay coach Steve Terraszas, whose team beat Santa Cruz 3-2 in a non-league game on April 2. “We’ll just keep sneaking up on teams. Let them take us lightly -- we’ll just come out and play.”
The Cougars broke a scoreless deadlock in the top of the second inning, when Berghammer’s three-run double highlighted a four-run outburst.
Berghammer also had an RBI double in two-run fifth, and a run-scoring single in the sixth.
His .350 batting average (35 for 100) and 23 RBIs lead the team, numbers especially impressive considering he was hitless in his first 10 at-bats.
“It’s very unusual. I haven’t seen it in my eight years here,” Terraszas said of Berghammer’s impact as a freshman.
“People who’d seen him play Little League told me he was going to be a really good ballplayer, but I wanted to see it for myself and certainly after a week or two in practice he proved that he belongs.”
Berghammer is the first Cougar to start on the varsity since Spencer Waddell in 2006, when Terraszas was a varsity assistant. Waddell went on to play catcher at Santa Clara University.
“(Waddell) was very good player but I don’t think he had the impact that Brett has and he certainly didn’t have the stats that Brett does.”
HMB senior David Moody (7-0) pitched a six-hitter. He struck out six and allowed one earned run.
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Half Moon Bay 7, Soquel 2
HMB -- 040 021 0 – 7 7 1
S -- 000 110 0 -- 2 6 1
WP: Moody (7-0). LP: Hamby.
2B: Berghammer 2 (HMB). 3 hits: Berghammer (HMB). 2 hits: Waltrip (S). 5 RBI: Berghammer (HMB).
Records: Half Moon Bay 23-6. Soquel 17-9-1.
