Valley Christian High senior pitcher Riley Jones delivers one of his 77 pitches last Friday against Heritage Christian High in a 10-0 win. He pitched a complete game, two-hitter, striking out five and walking two as he picked up his third straight complete game and sixth of the season. He has allowed 18 hits and six runs with three shutouts in his complete games in 2025. Photos by Steve Fericean.
April 28, 2025
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
When Valley Christian High knocked off Heritage Christian High on Apr. 22 behind a one-hit, complete game performance from junior pitcher Josh Hulse, it clinched a playoff berth for the first time since 2021. But the Defenders wanted more, and they got it behind yet another specialty from senior pitcher Riley Jones.
He went the distance for the third straight outing, surrendered two hits and did not allow a runner to get past second base as V.C. sealed second place in the Olympic League with a 10-0 victory last Friday. He and Hulse now have a combined 10 complete games in 19 starts.
“One of the goals that we had coming into the season was to make the playoffs,” said V.C. first-year head coach Eric Slater. “We had a pretty high-level schedule playing some really good teams. We’ve had our successes; we’ve had some of our lumps in the road, but right now we’re playing some really good baseball. We’re getting great starting pitching, we’ve got some timely hitting going on right now and our defense is looking really, really good for us right now.”
When the Defenders (13-9, 5-1) last tasted playoff life, former head coach Matt Dahlenburg was in his second full season with the program and he guided the team to an 18-6 overall record, 10-2 in league, and the program’s first trip to the playoffs since 2017. But against the Warriors, senior shortstop Seth Dahlenburg went three for three and drove in one of the five runs the hosts put on the board in the bottom of the first inning.
“It feels good,” said Seth Dahlenburg. “Coach Slater has come in here and has done a very good job coaching and figuring out how we did bad and just turning that into [something] good. We mainly work on those double plays…working on the simple stuff to make sure that we’re smooth in the game to get outs for our pitchers.”
Jones retired six of the first seven batters he faced, hitting Eden Nalin on the first pitch with two outs in the top of the first inning. Three runners would reach first base in the third, but no one got to second because the following hitters all reached on a fielder’s choice.
Then in the fourth, Nalin doubled on the first pitch and Jones walked Cullen Hirtensteiner with none out. However, the team’s best pitcher, who has now pitched six complete games this season and improved to 8-2, struck out a pair of batters and got Joah Mier to fly out to junior left fielder Max Douglas. Jones would retire the last seven batters he faced on 21 pitches and finished the game striking out five batters, walking a pair and throwing 77 pitches.
“He’ll get behind guys and he’ll come up with big pitches,” said Slater. “One of the key differences today is that our defense was able to turn two huge double plays for him to drastically decrease his pitch count.”
Offensively, the Defenders supported Jones early and often as Mier walked junior second baseman Nico Villafana and gave up a double to sophomore first baseman Quintin Ekstrom to begin the bottom of the first. A groundout from junior third baseman Lucas Witt was followed by Dahlenburg’s base hit and 15 pitches into the frame, it was 2-0. V.C. would get one more hit in the inning but scored three more times because Mier would hit junior designated hitter R.J. Estrada and junior catcher Nolan Dietz and walk Douglas. When it was all said and done, 10 batters came up to bat and eight of the nine starters had either a hit, scored a run or drove in a run.
Valley Christian High Seth Dahlenburg delivers the first of his three hits, this one in the bottom of the first inning against Heritage Christian High in a 10-0 victory. His base hit to center would bring in junior second baseman Nico Villafana.
“This Heritage Christian team is a good ball club, and they’ve played a lot of teams tough,” said Slater. “For us to have that lead in the first inning was very, very helpful. But trust me, in this league, it’s never over until that last pitch is recorded. I’ve seen plenty of things happen, so it’s good to get on the board [early]. But you always need to keep adding to the score because all these teams can come back at any time.”
“I was just sitting up there, looking for a fastball; it’s the best pitch I could hit,” said Dahlenburg. “Once I saw it, I just banged it up the middle.
“I would say it’s the high energy coming into the game,” he later said. “All of us being on the same page, we’re getting hits when we need them and driving in those five runs in the first inning let’s our pitcher have just a nice, coast way of pitching.”
Valley Christian High junior second baseman Nico Villafana is on his way home for the first run of last Friday’s game against Heritage Christian High. The Defenders would post a 10-0 victory, clinching no worse than second place in the Olympic League.
Ekstrom led off the second with a base hit to left and scored on a double down the left field line from senior right fielder Austin Abrahams. The score remained 6-0 until the fifth inning when Abrahams and senior pinch hitter Weston Lynott both beat out infield singles wrapped around an out. Sophomore pinch hitter Mack Lynott then doubled in Abrahams and sophomore pinch hitter Lincoln Slater was safe on an error, allowing Weston Lynott to score.
In the next inning, Witt was hit by a pitch and later came home on a single to left from Estrada. Then with two outs, Dietz’ infield knock brought home Abrahams for the final tally. All 12 batters who had at least one at-bat reached base in some form as Abrahams, Ekstrom and senior right fielder Micah Tamminga, who would drive in two runs, all had a pair of hits.
“That was one of the great things we’ve been talking about in our team meetings, is how we can get a lot more people to contribute to the success,” said Slater. “Today was an absolute team effort. We hit up and down the lineup and we had productive at-bats. The best part about today is that all of our at-bats were really productive, whether we were moving guys over or getting RBI’s.”
Since their last trip to the playoffs, the Defenders have come close to a postseason berth each season but came up short. In 2022, they were 3-2 after five league games but winning the last two against Heritage Christian at the end of the season wasn’t enough as they finished in fourth place with a 5-7 league mark.
In 2023, V.C. finished in a tie for third place with a 6-6 league record but lost to Whittier Christian High 7-2 in a tiebreaker game. V.C. had taken two of three from the Heralds in the regular season. And last season from Apr. 9-19, the Defenders lost two games to Village Christian High by a combined three runs and fell to Whittier Christian twice by a combined three runs. During that stretch, they saw their league record go from 5-2 to 5-6; they would lose to Village Christian 6-1 on Apr. 20 to conclude league play at 5-7. Now, there won’t be any third place dramatics as the best either Heritage Christian or Whittier Christian can do is 4-4.
“It feels good; we have a chance of a league title, so that’s what our goal is now,” said Dahlenburg. “Our goal was to get second place in league this year, which we did. So our goal now is to get first place and a league title.”
V.C. wraps up league play at first place Maranatha High on Tuesday before hosting the Minutemen on Friday. The Defenders will also go to Bishop Montgomery High on Tuesday in the regular season finale. Last season, Maranatha, which is 15-6-1 in 2025, took two of three from the Defenders with the lone V.C. win coming in a wild 15-14 contest in which the Minutemen scored eight runs in the bottom of the seventh inning only to come up short. Before that, V.C. had lost eight straight and 21 of the last 22 in the series. A V.C. win on Tuesday will mean Friday’s game will decide who wins the league.
“That’s another great team,” said Slater. “It’s been a battle for us; every single series is a battle. We’re going to do the best we can to give 100 percent; we’re going to hopefully rely on our starting pitching and have some timely hitting. I’m excited to play them. I know they’re a great team and they’re a team that’s really, really tough to beat.”
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.