The Dos Pueblos LL 13U All-Stars suffered their first loss of the summer in an 8-5 defeat to Santa Paula LL on Friday at El Carro Park in Carpinteria.
DPLL will now take on Foothill LL on Monday at 5 p.m. at El Carro Park with a spot in the championship against Santa Paula on the line.
Isaiah Estrella got DPLL started with a bang, launching the first pitch of the game over the left-field wall for an early 1-0 lead.
However, Santa Paula answered back with one run in the first, two runs in the second and three runs in the third to pull away for a 6-1 advantage.
DPLL cut into the deficit in the top of the fifth courtesy of a two-run homer by Henry Wood and a bases-loaded walk from Estrella to make it 6-4.
Nick Brakka inched DPLL even closer with a leadoff home run in the top of the sixth to bring the deficit to 6-5, but Santa Paula plated two more runs in the bottom of the sixth and finished off the 8-5 win in the seventh.
The DPLL 13U team is made up of Cyrus Brunner, Hector Aguilera, Henry Wood, Isaiah Estrella, Julian Flores, Matteo Conant, Mauricio Galicia, Nick Brakka, Ollie Cottle, Santiago Grande, Sebastian Gutierrez, & Tyler Newendorp.
The coaches are Bryan Conant, Chris Lem, Mario Galicia and the manager is Ken Newendorp.