Sacramento State baseball found themselves in a dogfight of a series at home from John Smith Field starting on Friday against Abilene Christian University.
The Hornets fell early in the series, battled back in the second game, but ultimately succumbed in extra innings in the last game of the series.
May 3: Abilene Christian 7, Sac State 2
Friday night’s game started just like any other opening game series for the Hornets, with the team’s ace, senior pitcher Ethan Lay on the mound. Lay, the two-time Western Athletic Conference Pitcher of the Week, has been dominant all season against tough opponents, but his night started off rocky.
The Wildcats opened with a single down the left field line and a walk to back it up, putting runners on first and second with no outs.
In a 1-1 count to senior Wildcat third baseman Nick Arias, Lay left a pitch inside and over the middle. Arias turned on the pitch, sending a monstrous three-run home run off the wall of the parking garage in left field.
“He [Lay] wasn’t as sharp today, but you know what? It’s his 12th start of the year,” head coach Reggie Christiansen said. “He’s not been good twice. You know what I mean? So, at the end of the day, that’s baseball. He made two bad pitches tonight. At the end of the day, that’s the difference in the game.”
The 3-0 game slowed down for the next two innings as Lay got back-to-back 1-2-3 innings in the second and third, giving the Hornets a chance to make a comeback.
Sac State started off the bottom of the third with sophomore left fielder Brett Ott lining out to center field before the top of the order came back with freshman center fielder Sam Harry.
Harry stepped to the plate and swung at a pitch that was away from him, sending a hellacious blast off the second wall in right center field to bring the Hornets back into the game.
Only two pitches later did senior designated hitter Ryan Ellis do the same, digging out a pitch that was low and in for a blast of his own off the batter’s eye in center field.
“When it’s [the pitch] down like that, you just got to drop the head [of the bat] to it,” Ellis said of his home run. “I took it [that pitch] early in my first at-bat, I took a couple strikes down that I could have hit. So my approach was to ambush it and I got to it. ”
Sac State and Abilene Christian remained deadlocked in a pitching battle throughout the fourth and fifth innings as Lay and junior Wildcat pitcher Aidan Coleman traded blows.
Things opened up for the Wildcats in the top of the sixth, as they started the inning with back-to-back singles. The next batter laid a bunt down that was recovered and sent over to third where the lead runner was advancing, collecting the out and keeping the Wildcats at bay.
A wild pitch advanced the runners on first and second 90 feet each just before redshirt junior third baseman Jakob Poturnak made a diving catch to save a run. Poturnak leapt in the air just past the third base line, catching the ball and holding the runner at third. His throw to first hit the batters head at third, resulting in the bases being loaded.
“I just tried to put my body in front of it, make sure it doesn’t get past me,” Poturnak said. “But, you know, I just tried my best to do that. And I think I would have gotten out if he wasn’t in the way, but he couldn’t have done anything.”
The saved run from Poturnak turned out to be futile as a strike out from Lay was followed up by a grand slam over the center field wall by senior Wildcat first baseman Grant Watkins to make the game 7-2.
The score stood the rest of the game as the Hornets could not hit off of either Coleman or freshman Wildcat pitcher Baron Mannis. Sac State managed just five hits on the night.
“We weren’t very good,” Christiansen said. “I mean, it was just one of those things. I think we’ve listened to everybody telling us how good we are and the game of baseball is a very difficult game. You got to show up each and every day. It’ll humble you if you don’t and tonight, we didn’t show up.”
May 2: Sac State 4, Abilene Christian 3
The second game of the series saw the Hornets start off hot with junior pitcher Kurt Marton on the mound. Marton struck out the first batter he faced, and then walked the next, but got the Wildcats to hit into a 3-6-3 double play with the help of sophomore first baseman Jamie Mullin.
A 1-2-3 inning consisting of two strikeouts and a flyout led to the Hornets striking first in the bottom of the second when senior left fielder Luis Pimentel-Guerrero walked with one out.
With Mullin in the box, he hit a sky-high ball to shallow right center field. Pimentel-Guerrero never stopped running from first as the ball hung in the air. As he rounded third, the ball was dropped and he safely crossed home for a 1-0 lead.
“Originally I got the steal sign and there was already two outs,” Pimentel-Guerrero said. “So I think I had the bag [second base] because of the steal already and then I just saw the ball go up and with two outs I just kind of kept running. I kept my head down and luckily it dropped.”
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Pimentel-Guerrero had another chance to show off his base running skills in the bottom of the fourth as he hit a single into left field and then stole both second and third base on wild pitches.
Remarkably, a third wild pitch eluded senior Wildcat catcher Kanon Sundgren.
Pimentel-Guerrero saw his chance; he sprang into action, only for the ball to take a favorable bounce off the backstop behind home plate. With both Sundgren and Pimentel-Guerrero racing towards the plate, Sundgren got there first, sticking his glove out as Pimentel-Guerrero side-stepped the tag and danced onto home plate, giving the Hornets a 2-0 lead.
“I think base running is almost like the special teams in football,” Christiansen said. “It’s equally as important as the offense, the defense, and the pitching part of the game. You can advance on a ball in the dirt and score on a wild pitch. I think it’s huge.”
Marton went four innings as his pitch count rose to 80. He allowed just one hit while striking out seven Wildcats before the Hornet bullpen was called upon in the fifth.
“Kurt obviously kept us in the game,” Christiansen said.
Senior pitcher Colin Hunter immediately found trouble as he came in to relieve Marton, giving up a single, allowing a runner that advanced to second on a wild pitch and was brought home with a deep shot over the left field fence to tie the game at 2-2.
After a groundout and a walk, Hunter’s night was over in favor of senior pitcher Elijah Rogalski. Rogalski scored the last two outs of the fifth before he was replaced in the sixth by fifth-year pitcher Andrew Monson.
Monson himself did not last a full inning, giving up a double to the first man he faced, then back-to-back singles brought home the man on second and finally ended his night in favor of senior pitcher Ian Winterhalder.
Winterhalder secured the last out of the sixth as the Hornets were now down 3-2. Security finally came back to the mound, as freshman pitcher Trevor Wilson pitched the last three innings of the night, allowing just four hits while striking out two batters, securing his third win of the season.
“The big story is Trevor Wilson coming in and throwing three scoreless innings like he did,” Christiansen said. “That was outstanding.”
Sac State’s offense got to work with Wilson on the mound, tying the game in the bottom of the eighth when Ellis sent a single underneath the glove of the Wildcat first baseman to send in junior second baseman Cameron Sewell from second.
In the bottom of the ninth, Pimentel-Guerrero led off with a double into the corner in right field. A bunt from Jeremiah sent him to third, and a beautifully placed safety squeeze from sophomore pinch hitter Michael Perazzo brought him home.
The Hornets poured out of the dugout to celebrate the first walk-off win at John Smith Field all season.
“There’s nothing like it,” Perazzo said of celebrating with his team. “It’s awesome, that’s why we play. Everyone wants to celebrate after a win. There’s no feeling like it.”
May 3: Abilene Christian 13, Sac State 11
The rubber match of the series saw a high-scoring crapshoot from start to finish that went into extra innings. With the heavy winds in Sacramento, fly-balls were going the extra distance at John Smith Field.
Sophomore pitcher Timothy Carson lasted just 1.2 innings, giving up a home run in the first inning after walking the leadoff batter. Carson was charged with five earned runs off of four hits in his time on the mound for the Hornets.
“This team, obviously, is probably not a great matchup for Carson in these conditions,” Christiansen said. “Because he is a flyball pitcher, so that’s why his day was short today.”
The Wildcats had troubles of their own in the bottom of the first inning, when Harry sent a double down the right field line and Ellis walked to open the inning. After Dessens struck out, Poturnak stepped to the plate.
Fighting into a 1-2 count, Poturnak looked to protect the plate with men on first and second. He took a small step forward, turning on a pitch that was up and away over the second fence in center field to make the game 3-2.
“He was trying to slow me down,” Poturnak said of senior Wildcat pitcher Evan Whiteaker. “He threw me that fastball with two strikes, and I was able to fight it, stay inside of it and put it out to center field.”
Sewell continued the offensive explosion for the Hornets with a three-run blast of his own, sending a ball over the fence in right field, expanding the lead to 6-2.
Christiansen went to the bullpen for junior pitcher Sean Carey after Carson gave up a three-run bomb in the top of the second inning. Carey provided much needed stability as the game remained in a 6-5 deadlock over his 2.1 innings, allowing just one hit while getting six of his seven outs by the way of strikeouts.
Sac State then went to junior pitcher Konner Entz, who struggled in the top of the fifth inning.
Entz faced three batters, putting two on base with a walk and a hit-by-pitch, and allowing a double to the third that would score the first two.
The Wildcats scored one more run in the inning, giving them a 8-6 lead that was built on in the top of the sixth after they scored two more runs to make it 10-6.
With the bases loaded, the Hornets had a huge two-out rally in the bottom of the sixth to score three runs of their own to make it a 10-9 game, before taking the lead in the bottom of the seventh from a two-run single from sophomore left fielder Brett Ott.
“He threw pretty much all off-speed pitches to everybody before,” Ott said. “So, I was just trying to stay with my approach and trying to give a swing on it.”
Sac State took the 11-10 lead into the top of the ninth with senior pitcher Colin Hunter on the mound, who had dominated since coming into the contest in the top of the seventh. Hunter struck out the first batter and got the second to fly out to left field, only for the first pitch with two outs to be demolished over the fence in center field by senior Wildcat second baseman Maddox Miesse, tying the game at 11-11.
With the wind out of their sails, the Hornets gave up two more runs in the top of the tenth and failed to score any more in the bottom half of the frame, losing 13-11.
“Scoring early was great,” Christiansen said. “You know, the resiliency of them [the team] to battle back and even take the lead there, but we just couldn’t finish.”
Sac State now sits in fifth place in the WAC standings behind Utah Tech University and Abilene Christian, despite each team being 6-6. The head-to-head records between the teams does not bode well for the green and gold.
The Hornets aim to bounce back on the road against their Causeway Classic rival UC Davis on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
