LA JOLLA, Calif. -- The Cal State East Bay baseball team dropped the opener of its four-game California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) road series at UC San Diego on Thursday under the lights at Triton Ballpark, as UCSD pulled away to win by a final score of 25-2.
The loss drops the Pioneers a game below the .500 mark at 13-14 for the season.
The Tritons needed just 16 hits to tally their 25 runs, as they scored in bunches. The home team hit six home runs against Pioneer pitching, including a pair of grand slams.
UCSD also took advantage of three East Bay defensive errors, which led to three unearned runs in the first off starter
Andrew Fernandez and three unearned in the fourth off
Ransome Alexander.
Alexander pitched a scoreless third, and freshman
Stas Kuntz retired the side in order in the seventh, but the Tritons scored multiple runs in each of the other six innings.
Offensively, the Pioneers totaled seven hits. They scored their first run in the second inning on singles by
Dallas Dey and
Kyosuke Ushimaru and an RBI ground out by
Jacob Eder. They picked up their second run in the ninth on a single by
Nolan Jekich and an RBI double by
Matt Cantelme.
Jekich was the only CSUEB player to reach base twice in the game, going 1-for-1 with a walk in two plate appearances off the bench.
One silver lining of the blowout loss is the Pioneers didn't use either of their top two pitchers -- seniors
Alex Vesia and
RJ Hanson -- after facing a big deficit early in the game. Both will likely be available when the series resumes Friday with a doubleheader starting at 1:00 p.m.