CHICO, Calif. – Forgive the Chico State baseball players for singing in the showers following Sunday’s vital 6-2 victory against Western Oregon. They were seriously influenced by the Jackson 5. Jackson Evans drove in the Wildcats’ final five runs as they rebounded from an early deficit behind the complete-game pitching performance of Scott Greene. Evans tied the game with a two-out RBI-single in the fifth, gave Chico State the lead with a two-run homer in the seventh, and put the game away with a two-out, two-run single in the eighth.
Greene, who gave up solo home runs in the first and second, shut out Western Oregon on just three hits over the final seven innings for his first complete game in a Chico State uniform. After the second, he pitched as if it were A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, retiring Western Oregon in order in the third and fourth during a stretch in which he set down 10 in a row.
After Western Oregon leadoff hitter Grant Grover doubled with two down in the fifth to extend his hitting streak to 22 games, Greene did not allow another hit until Grover singled leading off the eighth. A pop out, strikeout, and fly out ended that inning, and after a two-out double in the ninth, Greene retired Cesar Lopez on a ground ball to third to end the game.
Chico State, ranked No. 4 in the West Region, improved to 30-16 by taking three of four in the crucial series against Western Oregon, ranked No. 6 in the West. Perhaps most importantly, the Wildcats added another impressive win to their resume while dealing Western Oregon (27-14) a debilitating series defeat. Chico State is now 8-8 against teams ranked in the West Region’s top six, while Western Oregon fell to 1-7 against the region’s top competition and 3-10 against California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) foes.
The winner of the CCAA Championship Tournament and top three remaining teams in the region, as determined by the NCAA, will participate in the NCAA Championship Tournament West Regional May 13-16. The Wildcats wrapped up an opportunity to earn the CCAA Championship Tournament’s automatic bid when Cal State Stanislaus was beaten at Cal Poly Pomona Sunday. And this weekend’s series victory against a Western Oregon team that came to town riding a 16-game winning streak undoubtedly helped the Wildcats’ chances of earning an NCAA Tournament berth if they don’t make it automatic by winning the CCAA Championship Tournament in Stockton May 6-8.
Chico State will wrap up the regular season by hosting a four-game series with Cal State Monterey Bay next Friday through Sunday. They will finish fourth in the CCAA regular-season standings and open tournament play against regular-season champion UC San Diego barring at least three wins next weekend and some help from Cal State Dominguez Hills. The Toros currently hold a two-game edge over the Wildcats in the conference standings and also hold the tiebreaker over the Wildcats.
All that said, Chico State certainly feels much better about all of those scenarios following Sunday’s impressive victory, its 53rd in 61 games all-time against Western Oregon.
They didn’t feel good in the game’s early going. The red-hot Jason Mosebey clubbed his fifth extra-base hit of the series, a home run with two down in the first, to stake the Wolves to a 1-0 lead. Daniel Dillard then smashed a home run to over the wall in deep left-center leading off the second, and following consecutive one-out singles by Devon Bouvier and Lopez, the Wolves seemed primed to take a formidable lead.
But Greene got consecutive groundouts to escape the jam and settle into a groove. It was as if he was saying to Head Coach Dave Taylor: “I’ll be there” for the rest of the afternoon.
In the meantime, Chico State’s offense was remembering the feeling of Saturday’s doubleheader sweep and seemed to be thinking: “I want you back.”
They threatened to break through in the second on Adrian Bringas’ two-out double and in the third on Jordan Larson’s one-out double. But both times the runners were stranded. They eventually got on the scoreboard in the fourth when Arakawa doubled to deep center and later scored on a wild pitch, trimming the deficit to 2-1.
Ben Manlove put the offense right back in business with a leadoff single in the fifth and moved into scoring position on Larson’s sacrifice bunt. With two outs and facing a two-strike count, Evans tied the game at 2-2 by flipping a bloop single to center field.
As was the case all weekend, Larson was in the middle of another Chico State rally in the seventh thanks to his leadoff single. Two batters later, Evans belted a two-run homer to right-center field, giving Chico State a 4-2 lead and putting the Wildcats in position to beat Western Oregon in come-from-behind fashion for the fifth time in the last two seasons.
Chico State gave Greene some extra breathing room with two more runs in the eighth. Deven Braden and Manlove notched consecutive one-out singles before Bouvier made a spectacular diving catch in shallow right-center to rob Larson of his fourth hit of the game, stemming the tide for at least a moment. But Michael Murphy was hit by a pitch to load the bases and Evans followed with a base hit to left that plated two runs and stretched Chico State’s lead to 6-2.
Evans finished 3-for-5 and Larson went 3-for-4 with a sacrifice bunt to spark the Chico State offense. Manlove went 2-for-4 and scored twice.
Glover and Bouvier notched two hits apiece to lead Western Oregon. Dustin Fulks (1-1) took the loss, allowing three hits in the seventh, including Evans’ two-run bomb. Western Oregon starter Cam Nobles lasted four-and-two-thirds innings, allowed two runs on six hits and a walk, and struck out three.
Pleasant Valley High School product Logan Lotti made his only appearance of the series in the ninth inning and flew out to left field. Lotti has started 26 games this season but is battling an injury.
Western Oregon, well on its way to its ninth Great Northwest Athletic Conference title in the ninth year of the conference’s existence, will wrap up its regular season with four home games against Central Washington next weekend and four on the road at Saint Martin’s May 7-8.
BOX SCORE
WILDCATS NOTES – The victory was Chico State Head Coach Dave Taylor’s 500th as a member of the program. He was the pitching coach from 1997-2004 and took over head coaching duties in 2007. With Taylor in the dugout, the Wildcats are 500-188-1 all time…Arakawa, who earned a West Region Rawlings Gold Glove as a right fielder in 2009, dropped a foul ball in the first inning for his first error since April 3, 2009, spanning 67 games…Chico State’s infield committed just one error in 114 chances on the weekend…Chico State is now 40-5 at Nettleton Stadium and 55-9 overall in regular-season, non-conference games in Dave Taylor’s era as head coach…The Wildcats’ starting pitchers accounted for 30-and-a-third of the team’s 34 innings pitched this weekend, allowing just 29 hits and four walks…Greene limited Western Oregon to one single in 10 at-bats with runners on base…Arakawa’s double was the 31st of his career, tying him with Mike Barney for 11th in Chico State history (1986-88). That’s eighth all-time among two-year players…Larson is now just three runs shy of 100 for his career and four hits shy of 150 for his career…The Wildcats are now 17-2 in games in which they hit a home run this season.
