By Special to the Town Crier

Although the Los Altos-Mountain View Pony Baseball All-Stars were eliminated after three games in last week’s regional tournament, it doesn’t take away from the section title they won July 28.

LA-MV captured the Pony Division (ages 13-14) Mid-Peninsula Section Tournament with a 9-1 victory over Half Moon Bay in the championship game at Rosita Field in Los Altos.

This marked the first time in LA-MV’s 15-year history that it had won a section championship at this age level.

LA-MV opened the week-long tournament by beating Half Moon Bay - which it would face again later on - Burlingame, then San Carlos. During that stretch, LA-MV got nearly perfect pitching from Erik Davis, Joseph Hatasaki, David Ronconi and Dustin Johnson, allowing a total of one run.

In the first win over Half Moon Bay, Davis struck out 14 of the 15 batters he faced. On the offensive side, LA-MV scored 26 runs, with offensive firepower from the entire team, led by Michael Morales, Troy Haury, Mike Rohrs, Jason Marshalla, Davis, Hatasaki and Ronconi.

The three wins qualified LA-MV for the championship game, where the team would need to win only one of two games in the double-elimination tournament.

Despite Half Moon Bay’s opening loss to LA-MV, it worked its way back through the loser’s bracket for a rematch in the championship game. Half Moon Bay made LA-MV earn the title by shutting out the home team 8-0 to force a deciding game the next day.

LA-MV rebounded in the second game, as Haury went the distance on the mound and Morales had a bases-loaded-clearing double to break it open en route to a 9-1 win.

LA-MV got tremendous support from its entire 15-player roster throughout the tournament, including solid offense and defense from Tom Cronin, David Diaz, Bobby Graviano, Ted Hong, Craig Moberg, Patrick O’Donnell and Andrew Shaw.

LA-MV Pony president Skip Mueller and Pony Division director Dan Bertolet were on hand to award the championship medals and pennant to the team.

“That was the most pleasurable experience I’ve ever had as president of our league,” Mueller said.

LA-MV then moved on to the Northern California Regional Championships, which started last Thursday in Santa Clara.

LA-MV opened with an 8-0 loss to defending U.S. Western Champion Santa Clara.

LA-MV bounced back on Saturday by defeating San Jose PAL 13-8, getting home runs from Moberg and Morales.

LA-MV led 8-1 going into the bottom of the fifth, then San Jose scored seven runs to tie it up. LA-MV recaptured the lead with a run in the sixth and put the game away with four more in the seventh.

The following day, LA-MV was eliminated from the tournament with a 7-1 loss to Monterey.

“They ran into a hot pitcher against Monterey,” Mueller said.

Los Altos was coached by Tom Davis, Rob Ronconi and Mark O’Donnell.