{"id":6732,"date":"2026-05-23T18:24:03","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T18:24:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/?p=6732"},"modified":"2026-05-23T18:24:03","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T18:24:03","slug":"knights-season-ends-with-11-5-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/?p=6732","title":{"rendered":"Knights’ season ends with 11-5 loss"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Concord scores early, knocks off Kelseyville in Division 5 quarterfinals<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brian Sumpter<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lake County Sports on Facebook<\/p>\n\n\n\n

KELSEYVILLE >> As quickly as the Kelseyville Knights made a game of it Friday afternoon with a three-run bottom of the third against Concord, the Bears answered with a four-run top of the fourth and never looked back, winning 11-5 in the quarterfinal round of the North Coast Section Division 5 playoffs at Lloyd Larson Field.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concord (11-15), the No. 14 seed in the original 16-team playoff field, scored twice in the top of the first and four times in the second to build a 6-1 lead before the Knights (14-13) got things rolling in the bottom of the third. Unfortunately, the shutdown inning Kelseyville head coach Billy Shaul was looking for in the top of the fourth never materialized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBig innings killed us,\u201d Kelseyville head coach Billy Shaul of Concord\u2019s two four-run innings against Knights starter Brayton Thomas, who didn\u2019t get much help from his infield defense, which committed three costly errors in those two innings. \u201cWe put some pressure on them in the third, but we couldn\u2019t hold them in the fourth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelseyville certainly took a run at the Bears in the bottom of the third. With one out, Deake Lyndall singled to center field, but he didn\u2019t stay on first base very long. JD Smart mashed a triple to deep right-center field to make it a 6-2 game, and Case Pivniska followed with a RBI single. Two infield errors by the Bears provided the Knights with their third and final run of the inning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concord didn\u2019t dwell on its reduced lead very long. Its first two batters reached in the fourth on a double and a walk. Pascual Palafox then put down a sacrifice bunt and reached safely himself on a throwing error on the play, which scored a run. A walk loaded the bases and another walk forced home a run to make it 8-4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the bases loaded and still no outs, Shaul went to his bullpen for Reece Johnson, who allowed a RBI single to Jorge Bravo. Johnson retired each of the next batters \u2013 on a flyball with no advance and a force play at the plate with a drawn-in infield. Damian Kochaphum singled home the fourth run of the inning, but the Knights cut down a second runner trying to score on the play for the third out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI thought our pitchers threw well enough, but we didn\u2019t help them much (on defense),\u201d Shaul said. \u201cIt was not one of our better games on defense.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelseyville managed to get a run back in the bottom half on a pair of walks, a fielder\u2019s choice grounder and passed ball that brought home Michael Dougherty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Johnson worked out of a bases-loaded jam in the fifth before Concord scored in the sixth on a RBI single by winning pitcher Max Dashner. The Bears were looking for more in the inning, but third baseman Dougherty forced a runner at the plate before the inning ended on a flyball to center field.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelseyville managed to get a runner on base in the sixth and seventh but couldn\u2019t get anything going against Dashner, who worked 6 1\/3 innings before leaving the game with the bases empty and one out in the seventh because of the 110-pitch limit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe needed to get him out of the game earlier,\u201d Shaul said of Dashner, who labored hard in the early innings before settling into a pretty good groove.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dashner struck out seven, walked three and allowed three earned runs. Thomas took the loss, allowing hits, 10 runs (only four earned) in 3 1\/3 innings. He struck out one and walked three.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Bears finished with 15 hits and nearly had a 16th<\/sup> in the top of the seventh when Bravo lined a ball that ricocheted off the top of Dougherty\u2019s glove at third base, hit the ground and was fielded by shortstop Stone, who threw out the runner at first base by a half step \u2013 a 5-6-3 putout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six different Knights had hits, led by Smart (2-for-4, triple, RBI). Other hits went to Lyndall, Stone, Pivniska, Keithly and Elijah Watkins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Concord went up 2-0 in the first on a run-scoring single by Palafox and a run-scoring error. Kelseyville scored in the bottom half on a Stone two-out single.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Bears opened things up in the top of the second on a Dashner RBI single, a run-scoring error, and a two-run single by Jonah Oleole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelseyville opened 2026 by going 1-9, its young roster playing competitive ball but unable to win the close games in the first month of the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe knew what we had,\u201d Shaul said of his coaching staff overseeing a sophomore-dominated roster. \u201cOnce we got our young kids dialed in, we started playing some good ball. The last couple of years we\u2019ve had veteran teams, and it\u2019s hard when you\u2019re expected to win. This year we didn\u2019t have that pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shaul gave nothing but credit to Concord, which beat No. 3 seed Fort Bragg 5-3 in opening-round action Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cProbably the most well-coached team we\u2019ve played this season,\u201d Shaul said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Shaul said the Knights have the talent to continue a streak of four straight league championships in the North Central League I, they still need one thing moving forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe biggest thing is we need leadership,\u201d he said. \u201cThese sophomores are ahead of the game, but we don\u2019t have that team leader yet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shaul also gave credit to his two starting seniors, third baseman Dougherty and left fielder Lee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLee played a great left field and had a couple of big hits for us in our win over St. Helena here (in Kelseyville),\u201d Shaul said. \u201cDougherty had a couple of big hits for us against Fort Bragg. Both of those guys came through for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

GAME NOTES<\/strong>: Kelseyville has lost in the quarterfinal round of the playoffs four years running \u2026 The only other remaining NCL I team headed into Friday\u2019s action, St. Helena, lost 5-4 to St. Patrick\/St. Vincent in the quarterfinals \u2026 Las Lomas, the team that defeated Clear Lake in last year\u2019s Division 4 championship game, is the No. 1 seed in Division 3 this year and has advanced to the semifinal round \u2026 Kelseyville was well represented on this year\u2019s All-League team selected by the league coaches. The MVP award was split between two players on other teams \u2026 After the All-League team is released, Lake County Sports will follow with the All-County team \u2026 Kelseyville has won 15 league titles going back to the 2000 season. Since there was no league race in 2020 and 2012 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Knights have won outright or shared 15 of 24 league titles since 2000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Concord scores early, knocks off Kelseyville in Division 5 quarterfinals By Brian Sumpter Lake County Sports on Facebook KELSEYVILLE >> As quickly as the Kelseyville Knights made a game of it Friday afternoon with a three-run bottom of the third against Concord, the Bears answered with a four-run top of the fourth and never looked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6733,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,84,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6732"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6732"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6734,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6732\/revisions\/6734"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briansumptersports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}