LA JOLLA, Calif. - Nationally-ranked baseball rivals UC San Diego and Cal Poly Pomona picked up right where they left off a season ago.
After four of six meetings in 2014 were decided in the final inning, with three walk-offs, No. 17 UCSD walked it off in 11, 4-3, over No. 20 CPP to open a key California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) series Thursday night at Triton Ballpark.
With Gradeigh Sanchez having just gone from first to third on his first stolen base of the season and the first Bronco defensive miscue of the night as the catcher's throw sailed into center field, Justin Flatt pulled the very next pitch from star closer J.J. Franklin through the hole on the right side to end it. The redshirt freshman was facing a 2-2 count after taking two called strikes and fouling one off, and produced the first walk-off hit of his college career. It was indeed UCSD's first triumph of the walk-off variety of 2015, in its very first extra-inning contest of the campaign.
Sanchez had singled up the middle with two outs. In the starting lineup for the eighth game in a row, all in the leadoff position, the junior out of Mission Viejo produced four of the Tritons' seven hits, finishing 4-for-6 with the key steal and winning run. His singles went through the right side, through the left side, down the left field line, and finally up the middle.
Cal Poly Pomona had entered the contest tied for second behind the first-place Tritons. With the result, UCSD maintains a two-and-a-half-game cushion atop the 11-team conference standings at 23-9 overall and 19-5 in the CCAA. CPP falls to 22-9 overall and 14-7 in league play. Cal State Monterey Bay leapfrogged CPP and Cal State L.A., a 3-2 loser at home to Chico State, and into second, as the Otters also walked off in extra innings, 15-12 in 10, at home over SF State earlier Thursday.
Javier Carrillo, Jr. (1-0) threw the 11th and was the beneficiary of Flatt's hit for his first decision in a Triton uniform. He battled back from a 3-0 count to get Ryan Webberley swinging to open the final frame, and worked around a one-out infield single and subsequent sacrifice by inducing an inning-ending groundout to third.
Franklin (0-2), the CCAA leader with nine saves, was denied his 10th and indeed ended up with the loss. The senior right-hander came on in the 10th after the Broncos had grabbed their first lead of the night at 3-2, but the Tritons quickly loaded the bases off of him. Michael Mann nudged a 1-2 pitch up the middle, Jack Larsen worked a five-pitch walk, and Troy Cruz (Chula Vista/Bonita Vista HS) reached via fielder's choice sacrifice when first baseman Nick Cooksey fielded his bunt and tried to cut pinch-runner Tim White down at third but was too late. Erik Lewis grounded into a double play as the tying run came in, but that's all UCSD could muster. Franklin got the strikeout to strand the winning run at third in Larsen.
The extra-inning, four-hour affair overshadowed two great performances from the respective starters on the mound. Triton ace Justin Donatella went without a decision for the first time this season, though he had become eligible for the win after exiting a tie contest for the second straight start. On Thursday night, UCSD was unable to hold onto its precarious 2-1 edge in the ninth. Donatella went seven full frames and allowed just the single run on a pair of hits and one walk. The junior right-hander added nine strikeouts to increase his league-best season total to 70. His ERA went up just slightly, back to a still-CCAA-low 0.70.
The lone run against Donatella was courtesy of senior Bronco centerfielder Kyle Garlick's league-leading 11th home run of the season, an absolute moon shot over the left field wall and into the dark La Jolla night with one gone in the sixth to level the score at 1-1. It was the first long ball against Donatella in 51.1 innings in 2015.
On the other side, senior right-hander Chris Powell went 6.2 frames and gave up two runs on three hits and six walks, striking out six. He set UCSD down in order in the third.
CPP frustrated Donatella early on to the tune of 24 two-strike foul balls over the first four frames, ultimately limiting him to the seven innings with 114 pitches. A remarkable 89 of those went for strikes for an impressive strike rate of 78 percent. Donatella had a trio of perfect frames, in the second, third and seventh, retiring nine in a row between a foreboding 11-pitch walk to Christian Kelley to begin the game, and a Garlick single with the first toss of the fourth.
The Tritons struck first in the second. Powell issued back-to-back five-pitch walks to Cruz and Lewis to lead things off, and Brandon Shirley laid down the successful bunt. Brett Levy's right-sided groundout brought Cruz home. Following Garlick's homer in the sixth, UCSD almost duplicated that second in the home half, with successive walks leading into a bunt. Lewis' flyout to left was too shallow to score Mann from third, however, and Powell got an emphatic strikeout to end the threat.
UCSD loaded the bases in the seventh on a one-out single, and two more walks with two away around a pitching change to end Powell's night. Austin Boyle then also gave Larsen a free pass to force Tyler Howsley in for 2-1.
Dan Kolodin took over for Donatella in the eighth and after a one-out Jacob Bernardy double into the left field corner, he got Kelley to chase an off-speed pitch for strike three, walked Garlick intentionally and fanned Cooksey as well. CPP did tie it off of Kolodin in the ninth, taking advantage of a fortuitous carom on a Matt Muñoz single to advance runners to the corners with one away ahead of a wild pitch.
With the go-ahead run at second, Cruz kept a sharp ground ball by Webberley in front of him and fired across the diamond for the second out. Nicholas Bruno then reached on a fielding error by Howsley, UCSD's sophomore shortstop, and swiped second. That's when Bernardy lifted a fly ball that clearly was going to drop in front of Flatt in left field, only for Howsley to come out of nowhere to make the incredible grab with his back toward home plate, saving two runs.
A two-out, two-strike RBI single by pinch-hitter Mike Philp bounded through the left side for the third Bronco run in the visitor 10th, before the Tritons completed their second come-from-behind win in a row, both by identical 4-3 scores.
UCSD and Cal Poly Pomona continue their series with another primetime affair at Triton Ballpark on Friday, April 3, at 6 p.m. The set concludes Saturday at Scolinos Field in Pomona with a noon doubleheader.
Triton Notes: Gradeigh Sanchez extended his career-best hit streak to nine games, tying Justin Flatt for the longest such streak by a Triton in 2015 ... Flatt and Sanchez moved their respective reached-base streaks to 16 and 14, which lead the team ... Thursday marked the first four-hit effort for Sanchez of his career, with the junior batting .463 (19-for-41) during this nine-game hit streak ... Jack Larsen, Erik Lewis and Troy Cruz had three, two and one walk, respectively, to move their season tallies to 24, 24 and 27, with Cruz still pacing the CCAA and Larsen and Lewis tied for second ... With two defensive miscues, UCSD saw its season-best streak snapped of six straight games without an error ... The Tritons have won six in a row at home.
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