Destrehan squad advances to face Southland in legion playoffs for chance at state

By JOHNNY PEPPO

Sports Editor

Valero St. Charles rolled on in the American Legion playoff tournament Monday when they decimated Hahnville’s Otto Candies squad 24-0 at the Southwest Regional round held in Gonzales.

The pair of District II West teams went through five innings with the DHS-based team racking up 22 hits in five innings. Led by Jules Roussel from the mound and the batter’s box, who pitched a two-hitter and had three hits for four RBIs including a three run homer in the third.

The outcome of this game eliminates Otto Candies while advanced Valero to see Southland. The winner of that game will be move on to play for a chance at the American Legion state tournament Aug. 5 in Shreveport.

The Hahnville and Destrehan squads had to face each other once already in this post-season. That game, a district II playoff held at DHS, was a 12-2, five inning game where Kyle Shnowski got three of his team’s 15 hits and four of their 12 points.

The outcome of that game advanced Destrehan to the regional tournament where they saw the St. Amant-based Pitt Stop team last Saturday. There, Valero fell behind early on and had to play catch-up from 11 points behind. Back-to-back five run innings in the sixth and seventh brought them back into the game, but they just couldn’t put together another burst on offense, eventually falling by a 15-11 score. Shnowski again led Valero from the plate, going 2-for-4 with two RBIs.

HHS squad splits pair

After their loss at Destrehan, Otto Candies ran the district II west loser’s bracket to meet up with the Southland Hogs in regional play on Saturday. There, the Hahnville squad escaped the bottom of the ninth inning with a 7-6 win. And though they never trailed against the hogs, Otto Candies also never led by much in this match-up.

Led by Jody Landeche, who recorded four hits and four RBIs, and John Gomez, who had three hits for two RBIs, the HHS squad broke a 1-1 score with three runs in the seventh and added three more in the eighth. Southland put the pressure on with five scores of their own in the bottom half, but pitcher Taylor Domengeaux preserved the one run lead in the bottom of the ninth inning.

The Hahnville-based team then moved on to battle Gauthier & Amadee of Gonzales in a game where Otto Candies took an early lead that fizzled by the sixth inning en route to an 18-8 loss. Jordan Stephany was the offensive highlight for his team, getting a pair of hits and a pair of RBIs.

Valero tops Central Lafourche

The Valero St. Charles team took a 9-7 win over Central Lafourche Sunday in the southwest regional. Destrehan’s Byron Clark stayed undefeated from the mound for his sixth victory and Shnowski posted three of his teams 11 hits for four of their nine runs. But wins at this level of the legion playoffs never come easy.

The Central Lafourche team opened the game with a pair of runs in the top of the first. Valero pulled ahead in the bottom of the second to take a 4-2 lead going into the third, and maintained their lead throughout, adding runs to pad the lead in both the third and sixth innings. Central Lafourche got it to with in two points in the seventh, but Clark turned them away in both the eighth and ninth to record the win.