Outs

In two days, it went from having an undefeated season to having its year come to an end. A day after falling to the second-chance bracket of the Little League District 16 Tri-Cities Major Baseball Tournament, Two Guys from Italy found itself needing a victory to keep its once perfect season alive. The Burbank League's Angels proved to be too much for the squad from the Foothill League, defeating Two Guys 7-3, on Friday at Montrose Park. "It was a tough loss," said Two Guys Coach Hutch Arzoumanian, whose team - which lost to Warren Printing, 11-1, on Thursday - ended its season at 26-2.

NORTHEAST GLENDALE - Neither Chris Stroh or Julian Jarrad are one of the 25 pitchers listed on the Glendale Angelenos roster, but they were both called upon by Angelenos Coach Tony Riviera to close out Friday's game. While the pair let one run slip through, Jarrad retired the final two batters of the game to pick up the save in the 4-3 victory over Long Beach Legend at Stengel Field. "Stroh has been fantasy pitching in the outfield the entire season and I got a little tired of seeing it so I thought I'd let him put his money where his mouth is," said Riviera, whose team improved to 19-6 with the win. "We try to do stuff differently all the time to make the team feel a little bit loose and confident.

LANCASTER - For a second straight evening, the brute strength of the Quartz Hill Major Baseball All-Star team proved both impressive and unbeatable, much to the chagrin of Crescenta Valley. Host Quartz Hill homered three times, including two shots from No. 3 hitter Alex DeShields, in rallying for a devastating 5-4 victory in Wednesday evening's winner-take-all Section 2 championship game at Gilbert Memorial Field in Lancaster. With the defeat, District 16 champion Crescenta Valley, which was gunning for its first sectional title since 2007, concludes its dual-tournament record at 5-2. District 51 champion Quartz Hill, which captured its first sectional crown in three years and forced a deciding game by defeating Crescenta Valley, 15-4, on Tuesday with four homers, advances to Saturday's Division III North Tournament at Ladera Little League Field in Los Angeles.

NORTHEAST GLENDALE - A key pinch hit and a pair of long home runs got the Glendale Angelenos back on track following a tough road trip. Back at Stengel Field after losing two games in a row for the first time this season, Glendale received a clutch pinch-hit double from John Schwer and a pair of homers from Sako Chapjian to earn a 10-5 victory against the Gold Coast Braves in an Independent Collegiate Summer League contest. Schwer, a former Glendale Community College standout, broke a 4-4 deadlock with a two-run double to right to give the Angelenos a 6-4 lead with one out in the sixth inning.

NORTHWEST GLENDALE ? Two outs were all that separated the Hoover High baseball team from the first round of the CIF Southern Section Division I tournament. Two outs too many. Visiting Arlington of Riverside rallied for two runs with one out in the top of the seventh inning to edge past Hoover in a 4-3 nailbiter in a wild-card game Tuesday afternoon at Hoover High. "Our kids played with a lot of heart and a lot of desire. That's all I asked of them before the game, to come out, play with heart and play to their potential, and I got it," said Hoover Coach Jim Delzell, whose team ended its season at 14-10 after a third-place Pacific League finish.

Hamlet Nalbandyan Kirsten Slouber is the new girl on the team, but the 15-year-old just might be the person to take the Glendale Senior Softball team to its second consecutive World Series championship. The reigning title holders had no problem moving into the championship game of the Little League Section 2 Tournament, all thanks to Slouber's dominance in the circle and the stellar defense behind her. Glendale, the District 16 representative, beat District 17's San Marino, 2-0, Sunday at Montrose Park as Slouber tossed a no-hitter.

NORTHEAST GLENDALE - A four-hour thriller saw the Glendale Angelenos trail, tie and then fall behind by as many as five runs in the seventh inning. But Glendale's summer collegiate baseball club made an improbable comeback when Ruben Padilla singled up the middle with two outs to score Matt Tellesco for the game-winning run. It capped a seven-run ninth inning, as the Angelenos defeated the SoCal Halos, 11-10, at Stengel Field. Glendale (7-2) trailed, 10-4, heading into the bottom of the ninth, as it got five hits, including four straight to close out the win. "Words can't describe how elated I am," Angelenos Coach Tony Riviera said.

MONTROSE — With their early lead, and even their starting pitcher, gone before the end of the top of the second inning, the tide seemed to be turning against the Foothill All-Stars in their District 16 9-10 Softball Tournament if-necessary championship contest with the Tujunga All-Stars on Tuesday. Alex Howard was able to right Foothill’s ship with 2 2/3 innings of one-hit ball in emergency relief of Jordan Lousararian and Tujunga’s control and fielding difficulties provided Foothill with ample scoring opportunities in a 13-3 mercy-rule shortened game at Montrose Park.

BURBANK — At this point, Crescenta Valley High pitcher Nate Rousey might be the last guy the Burbank baseball team wants to see on the mound. The sophomore right-hander beat the Bulldogs for the second time this season on Tuesday afternoon, allowing one run on four hits over seven innings to lead the Falcons to an 8-1 Pacific League victory at Burbank. “I was just trying to get ahead in the count and let the defense work for me,” said Rousey, who received plenty of run support from Troy Mulcahey and Elliott Surrey, who both went four for four with a combined seven runs batted in. The win was Crescenta Valley’s 12th in its last 13 league games since dropping its league opener to Burroughs on March 23. The Falcons’ only loss in that span came to Arcadia, which clinched the league title on Tuesday with its win over Glendale.

LA CAÑADA FLINTRIDGE — It took a while for the Flintridge Prep softball team to get a feel for the timing of Providence starting pitcher Natalie Kasbarian. Once it did, the result was a five-run sixth inning, as the Rebels broke open a tie ballgame. That outburst was just enough to withstand a furious seventh-inning comeback attempt by the Pioneers, who fell one run short in the Rebels' 9-8 nonleague win on Friday afternoon at Flintridge Prep. "These girls have been working real hard, and what I like is that it was a total team effort," Rebels Coach Julie Jaime said.

The new state budget could push Glendale Unified out of contention for extra money earmarked for school districts with a majority of students who are poor or are learning English. The budget draft originally proposed that districts would receive the extra money - called concentration grants - if the district's population of students who are learning English, eligible for free or reduced-price lunches, or in foster care exceeded 50%. At the time, Glendale Unified appeared poised to capitalize on the formula, with about 53% to 56% of its students meeting the criteria.

PASADENA - While Sunday afternoon's second annual San Gabriel Valley All-Star Boys' Volleyball Game at La Salle High had its pleasantries and moments of fraternity, there was a certain edge this time around that perhaps lacked a year earlier. The area public high school teams, which were swept in the inaugural event last June at Caltech University, took revenge in winning both of this year's underclassmen and senior contests, with the highlight being a come-from-behind 21-25, 22-25, 25-22, 25-23, 15-12 senior triumph.

Authorities are investigating the cause of a fire in a building in downtown Glendale Monday that reignited hours after firefighters knocked down the original blaze . Two firefighters suffered minor injures while battling the first blaze early Monday morning in the 200 block of North Brand Boulevard at 12:16 a.m., said Glendale Fire Department spokeswoman Brandy Villanueva. Firefighters on that call arrived to discover the second floor of the two-story building on fire. The building's first floor is commercial, with the second story containing eight apartments, only one of which had been rented out, Villanueva added.

Police plan to step up enforcement activities Friday against motorists using their cell phones while driving. The plan follows last month's distracted-driving crackdown in which more than 400 citations were issued. Officers assigned to the enforcement operation, which is being funded through a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, will be focused that day on looking only for distracted drivers, Glendale Police Sgt. Harout Bouzikian said. In April, officers cited 425 motorists for holding their cell phones while behind the wheel, he said.

Officer Bryan Duncan was running late to a drunk-driving enforcement operation on March 17 when he witnessed a major traffic collision on the Foothill (210) Freeway that quickly escalated into an inferno. Duncan jumped off his motorcycle, ran toward the collision - which involved a Dodge Challenger and a Nissan Sentra - and began calling for emergency crews. After Duncan and a passerby pulled the driver from the fiery Nissan, he tried using a fire extinguisher to douse the flames.

Kenneth Landon's letter from May 3 is devoid of logic. Landon claims that the city clerk's inability to publish ballots in the Korean-language “disenfranchised” Korean-speaking voters. There is not a single documented incident of a Korean-speaking Glendale-voter who claims he or she was discouraged from voting because he did not receive a Korean-language ballot. Voter outreach and disenfranchisement are completely different terms. When a government encourages people to vote, that is voter outreach.

Six local schools participated Saturday in the CIF Southern Section Division prelims at various locations across Southern California. The following is a roundup of those who advanced to the CIF finals next Saturday. DIVISION I BOYS Crescenta Valley and Glendale at Trabuco Hills High: Michael Davis of Glendale and Gabe Collison of Crescenta Valley punched their tickets to the division finals on Saturday at Mount San Antonio College. Davis, who advanced to the state meet in the 200-meter dash last season, clocked 21.41 in the event Saturday to take third.

GLENDALE - Coming into their season-ending rivalry game on Thursday, the Glendale High and Hoover softball teams had somewhat disappointing seasons. Both the Nitros and Tornadoes were out of the playoff hunt in the bottom half of the Pacific League pack. But one of them would end the season with a win and a rivalry win, to boot. "It's huge," Glendale Coach Christine Paknik said. "There's no bigger word you can use. They needed this. This is how they should have played all year.

MEN'S GOLF Park at Southern California Regionals: Jin Park finished with a two-round score of 158 on Monday at Costa Mesa Golf and Country Club. Park opened with a 10-over-par 82 before posting a 76 during his second round. The cut was 149. "He had some trouble, especially early on in the first round," Glendale college Coach Greg Osbourne said. "He couldn't convert on some pars. "It just wasn't there for him. "

Following a rainstorm in the heart of Ventura County, Paul Park heated up. The Crescenta Valley High junior boys' golfer put things together nicely and proceeded to put on one of his best performances of the season. Park shot a two-under-par 70 to finish second overall in the CIF Southern Section Northern Team Divisional at Soule Park Golf Course in Ojai. "Things worked out well for me on the course and I hit a lot of my shots on the greens," said Park, who finished behind Sean Croker of Westlake (67)