While the rest of the student body relaxed on the holiday weekend after a tough week of tests, the UCSD baseball team spent its break playing four games against the Cal Poly Pomona Broncos, sweeping the first doubleheader on Feb. 18 and splitting the second set of games on Feb. 19.
In the first doubleheader, played in Pomona, Calif., the Tritons reeled off two wins to sweep the Broncos at home before traveling to San Diego for the second doubleheader.
Coming off the two-straight wins, UCSD couldn’t keep the sweep going, allowing the Broncos to steal game three away thanks to a seven-run fifth inning.
The Tritons came out strong early in the loss, scoring three runs in the first two innings, while holding the Broncos scoreless. However, the Broncos bucked free from a shutout in the fourth as Marc Evans crushed a Byron Grubman pitch over the right-field fence for a two-run homer that put Cal Poly Pomona within a run.
Grubman managed to end the fourth inning with the UCSD lead barely intact, but he would not see the end of the fifth inning, as the Broncos rallied for seven runs. Cal Poly Pomona batted around in the inning and scored all seven runs with two outs, with the big blow coming on Ben Lebovitz’s three-run homer. After witnessing his starter suddenly unable to set down any Bronco batters, UCSD head coach Dan O’Brien relieved Grubman with freshman Derek Barham. Barham was coming off the worst outing of his career — giving up a walk-off home run to Cal State Dominguez Hills in the bottom of the ninth. His confidence did not seem affected, however, as he tallied the final out of the inning to send the Tritons back to the dugout suddenly trailing 9-3.
“We always try to stay away from a big inning,” junior reliever Michael Kearney said. “But this time, [Pomona] just came out strong.”
Despite giving up the lead, O’Brien found a positive outlook on Pomona’s rally.
“I think that [the rally] was a great opportunity for our pitching staff to learn that we can’t let their momentum put is in a hole,” O’Brien said.
The Tritons would go on to score three more runs in their half of the fifth inning, but it was to no avail, as the Broncos held on and added another two runs to their total, eventually winning the game 11-6.
After blowing their lead in game one, the Tritons returned to their home diamond in game two to avenge their earlier loss. In a game that saw four lead changes, UCSD went ahead for good in the fifth inning with a five-run rally.
“I thought we did a good job staying mentally strong after giving up the lead,” Kearney said. “We’re a real scrappy team and every inning we try and beat our opponents.”
The Tritons, despite taking an early lead, found themselves down by a run after Cal Poly Pomona took advantage of sloppy defense to go ahead 4-3. However, UCSD’s three errors did not prove disastrous, as the Triton bats made up for their iron gloves with a five-run fifth inning. The Tritons took a 5-4 lead on a sacrifice fly before freshman pinch-hitter Matt Cantele homered to deep right field to give UCSD a comfortable 8-4 advantage.
“Matt is just one of many players in a great freshman class,” O’Brien said. “And that is exactly what we need after losing 13 players from last season.”
Senior right-hander Ryan Leake took to the mound after the rally and pitched three scoreless innings to keep the Broncos from regaining the lead. Leake was credited with the win, his first of the season, in UCSD’s sixth overall victory.
“I think our bullpen has done really well at shutting teams down and maintaining our leads,” Kearney said.
The Tritons currently stand at 6-3 going into the beginning of California Collegiate Athletic Association play, which starts this week with the Tritons facing Cal State San Bernardino at home on Feb. 23 and Feb. 24.
“I think we’re good enough to win our league,” O’Brien said. “But we have a lot of maturing to do as a team and a lot of areas to work on. But if we play like I know we can, we can win the CCAA and go on to Regionals.”
