Fullerton was seeking its fifth straight win after sweeping a three-game series from Orange Coast, while Santa Ana was looking to stay undefeated in conference play and on top of the standings. There was a lot of tension from the third inning on out. The pendulum kept swinging from inning to inning, as both teams had opportunities to score runs due to miscues from the defensive side of the ball and walks.
The defense on both sides was bailed out at times due to base-running mistakes or spectacular plays on the field which led to double plays.
Fullerton could not get the offense going in the first four innings. Trailing 4-1 heading into the bottom of the fifth inning, the offense finally got their bats going. The rally began with an error by the Dons first baseman Nathaniel Williams, who was unable to scoop up a ball thrown in the dirt from shortstop Christian Altamirano.
That was followed by a chopper over the third baseman’s head into left field for a double. Fullerton’s dugout started making more noise and woofing when someone got on base. With runners in scoring position, Diego Vasquez drove in Jake Starr with an RBI groundout. After a groundout to the shortstop, Head Coach Chad Baum told Jake Larson during his at-bat to keep battling. Larson worked a walk after being behind in the count 1-2.
Trevor Schmidt came up to bat and Baum was telling him to get in front of the ball during his at-bat. He got well in front of the ball, crushing a two-run RBI double to right center field to tie the game at 4-4.
“I knew that they were going to try to beat me with a fastball because of that at-bat before, hit an off-speed to center. Waiting for the heater to come inside and got it, and did some damage with it,” said Schmidt.
Santa Ana took back the lead with a sacrifice fly to center after three batters walked in the top of the sixth. In the bottom half of the sixth, Fullerton kept the hot bats going with three straight singles. After a run scored on a double play ball, Nate Pone came up to the plate. On the first pitch, the ball went in between the legs of the catcher to the backstop, giving Fullerton their first lead of the game at 6-5.
“We were trying to rally, stay on our approach, we had good at-bats, we weren’t getting hits. We were trying to keep doing what we were doing, but hope for better outcomes,” said Pone.
Dugout was fired up and high-fiving each other. Dons answered with a run of their own on an RBI single to center in the seventh to tie the game. In the top of the eighth inning, Santa Ana took the lead for good with an Altamirano RBI single to left with two outs.
Pone felt that the pitchers didn’t execute the game plan. “Not really. We brought in our [bullpen], and they were a little shaky. We had guys like Christian Valent, he did what he was suppose to. Some of our other pitchers couldn’t finish innings,” said Pone.
Back in the top of the second inning, when the game was tied at 1-1, Santa Ana started off with a base hit up the middle. The next batter looked like he was out on strike three. Baum wanted to know where the pitch was and the umpire said he missed high and inside. On the next pitch, Garret Allen doubled to right, putting runners on second and third. Baum got frustrated for the third strike not being called.
Cole Kenrich grounded into a fielder’s choice to drive in a run as Vasquez threw to Luke Viola at third and tagged the runner out. On the next play, Kaden Aimer bunted a ball down the third base line, in which Viola made a fielding mistake. He thought the ball would go foul, so he didn’t attempt to field the ball. As a result, it stayed fair and allowed Aimer to reach base.
Jack Mueller took advantage of the mistake with a rocket into center field to drive in Kenrich. That was followed by an RBI groundout from Altamirano to make it 4-1.
In the top of the third inning, there was drama from Santa Ana’s dugout. The Dons player started saying something to the third base umpire about a bad call. The umpire was telling the coaches and players to stop and Santa Ana Head Coach Tom Nilles told the umpire how he was talking to his players.
The home plate umpire didn’t see it that way and gave the Dons a warning. Nilles last words were “I am not the one talking” when the umpire continued speaking to the Santa Ana dugout. On the previous play, the umpires gathered together on a line drive caught by Vasquez before the ball hit the ground. The runner on second for Santa Ana went to third because he believed the ball was not caught.
Vasquez flipped the ball to second for a double play after the third base umpire called the batter out. Nilles did not see it that way. He believed that Vasquez dropped the ball and didn’t clearly secure the ball in his glove after it popped out of his glove.
The call stood and the umpires said Vasquez was transferring the ball from his glove to his hand. The Dons dugout was really animated after the play. They started making noise to distract pitcher Julian Castro on the mound but Castro worked his way out of it with a groundout to second with no runs scored.
The Dons added insurance runs in the top of the ninth inning. They were helped out by Fullerton’s defensive miscues and free passes.The rally started with a Connor Dietsch single to right in which Starr overran the ball and went by him, leading to Dietsch standing on second. Two pitches later, Dietsch was picked off at second. Relief pitcher Enrique Hernandez got a groundout, but could not get out of the inning unscathed.
Hernandez hit the next batter and things started tumbling down from there. Viola had a ground ball hit to him, but was unable to record the out, then Viola threw it over Schmidt’s head into the dugout allowing the runners to advance. With runners on second and third with two outs, the next batter walked to load the bases. Baum came out to settle Hernandez down and try to get out of the inning with no more damage.
Baum was not happy with the team’s performance. “I wouldn’t say proud, these are grown men. If they don’t compete, then I don’t know why they’re playing this game at the collegiate level. I’m not proud of competing because if they can’t do that they won’t win any games,” said Baum.
Viola made another throwing error on a chopper in which he rushed his throw, going wide of the bag leading to another run. Hernandez walked the next batter to bring in another run to make it 9-6.
“Couple of errors in the last inning, obviously that hurt. Those guys (batters) don’t come up if we walk nine guys and hit two. They had 11 free passes today and we broke at the end. They got a couple more runs and made it more difficult for us to manage with three outs to play,” said Baum.
Baum hopes this team can fix their mistakes. “It’s been happening all year and we have a young group. It’s not short of work or talent, it’s the experience is how you clean it up. This has been happening a little bit too much for us and that’s not part of our culture or fundamentals that we teach,” said Baum.
