In what turned out to be a hitter’s duel, the Cal Poly baseball team beat No. 3 Rice University in the last of season opening three-game series. The Mustangs were able to rally back after being down 6-2 in the fifth inning to beat the Owls 7-6 Saturday night at Baggett Stadium.
The Mustangs were 1-1 coming into the game, having lost the season opener Friday 10-7 and winning the first game of Saturday’s double-header 10-3.
According to Head Coach Larry Lee, the team had to first put Friday’s lost behind them in order to be successful in Saturday’s games.
“It was a good day, more so in how we responded after losing Friday night,” Lee said. “Rice is a very very good ball club and their expectations are high. We came out and were able to put Friday night’s game behind us. We played extremely well in the first game, and then today we got sloppy defensively in the fifth inning. We put that behind us, chipped away, and that gave us the opportunity to win the ball game late.”
Sophomore lefty Matt Leonard went 4.2 innings for the Mustangs, giving up three runs, walking two batters and striking out three others. After sitting out last season due to Tommy John surgery, Leonard was excited for his first start of this season.
“I was really excited. After sitting out a whole year, you kind of get anxious so it was nice to finally get out there again,” Leonard said. “I feel like my confidence coming in was pretty good so hopefully I’ll continue to have confidence when I step out on the field.”
The Owls were first on the score board with runs in both the second and third innings. The Mustangs were able to tie up the score at two runs a piece by taking advantage of an error by Rice’s shortstop Chad Mozingo and a wild pitch from their starting pitcher Mike Ojala in the bottom of the third inning.
The Mustangs brought in senior right hander Eric Massingham with one out in the fifth inning. The Owls then strung together a series of hits and capitalized on an error to score four times after the pitching change, which widened the scoring gap to 6-2.
The Mustangs were quiet until junior shortstop Kyle Smith scored on a wild pitch in the seventh inning.
Cal Poly scored three more times in the bottom of the eighth inning. They put together a pair of base hits by sophomore first baseman J.J. Thompson and Smith and an array of walks and hit batters to tie the game up again at six.
Massingham was able to shut down the Owls in the top of the ninth inning, clearing the way for the bottom of his team’s lineup to try to end the game with a run and secure him his first win of the season.
With one out, freshman left fielder Bobby Crocker singled to center field and then stole second base, putting him in scoring position for the number eight hitter J.J. Thompson. Thompson was able to turn on a hard fastball from Rice’s fourth relief pitcher Matthew Reckling that flew to the wall in center field, scoring Crocker to win the game.
“I was just trying to put the ball in play to move the runner over and have someone else behind me take care of it,” Thompson said. “The team battled hard, Matt Leonard came back and pitched a great game and the bullpen did their job. It just feels good to win.”
The Mustangs travel to Fresno State to play a single game against the defending national champion Bulldogs Tuesday at 6:05 p.m. at Beiden Field.