POWAY -- He has made his name as a pitcher, but on Wednesday, Joey DeNato made a statement with his bat.

Locked in a scoreless tie with Poway High in the seventh inning, DeNato lined a single to right to score the go-ahead run and left-hander Cole Swanson made the run stand up as Torrey Pines edged No. 4-ranked Poway 1-0 in the North County Times Tournament.

The win sends Torrey Pines (7-3) to Friday's 7 p.m. championship game at Escondido against either Vista, Rancho Buena Vista or Westview, each of whom will be in action Thursday.

The Falcons have the tie-breaker on Poway (9-2) and Rancho Bernardo, the other teams that went 4-1 in their bracket.

"I felt good my first three at-bats, I just didn't have anything to show for it," said DeNato, who popped up and had a pair of groundouts before his game-winning single.

"Poway pitched me inside all day. And they pitched me inside last year, too.

"So I went up there looking for something inside on the first pitch. I like the mental side of the game, and I think I'm pretty good at picking up patterns."

JJ Reading started the winning rally with a two-out walk and went to second on an Evan Mason single.

DeNato is the ace of the Torrey Pines staff. He went five innings Monday and picked up the win against Carlsbad.

Wednesday, he was in right field as senior Alex Tukey made his first start of the season.

Tukey, who had been battling pneumonia and had thrown just one inning all season, used a fastball clocked at 90-91 mph to strike out eight in four innings. Swanson allowed just one hit over the final three innings.

Poway's Joe Rosan was impressive, going 5 2/3 innings, allowing just three hits while striking out seven.

Tukey worked out of jams in the first three innings, when Poway put runners on second and third with one out, second and third with no outs and second with no outs.

"We've been dealing with a lot of injuries and illness," said Torrey Pines coach Matt Chess. "Tukey has been sick. My sophomore catcher (Garrett Stubbs) has a bad thumb. Michael Dmytryk (another pitcher) hasn't thrown yet. KC Rogers has a bad hip.

"We're battling our butts off.

"I asked the kids to get tough. And they certainly could have folded today, especially Tukey.

"Poway had so many chances early, but he worked hard and gave us a chance to win.

"Poway is a good team, a really good team. So to beat them in their park is huge."

With three good chances to score, Poway coach Bob Parry said the Titans had no one to blame for the loss but themselves.

"Both teams got great pitching and played great defense," Parry said. "The difference was they got a big hit and we didn't.

"We saw two good pitchers today. To win a CIF title, we need to beat pitchers like we saw today.

"Our hitters need to make adjustments. We work on getting runners on, getting them over and getting them in.

"We got 'em on, got 'em over, but did a poor job getting them in.

"Tukey was throwing hard, but we can hit the fastball.

"I think we tried to match his power instead of trying to make contact, put the ball in play and score a run.

"You can't come up empty three times with the opportunities we had."

DeNato believes Tukey's performance could give the Falcons the opportunity to challenge for the Avocado League title and a CIF crown.

"He was on JV last year," DeNato said. "He has improved so much. And the way he battled today really makes me proud of him.

"When we get healthy and get our pitching in order, we could make some noise."

Staff writer John Maffei can be reached at (760) 740-3547 or jmaffei@nctimes.com.