SANTA ANA - The three-seeded Dons opened the 2014 CCCAA Baseball Southern Regional Playoffs with a big 17-6 win over #14 Long Beach City College. The best-of-three series continues Saturday morning with game two at 11:00 a.m. at Santa Ana College.
The Vikings (21-16) opened scoring with a sacrifice fly by Stefan Miladinovich that scored Michael Thomas who led the game off with a triple on just the second pitch. But that lead wouldn't last long with the Dons (26-11) wasting no time in the bottom of the first inning.
Despite recording just two hits, the Dons put up five runs on a wild pitch, two errors, a RBI-groundout and a sacrifice fly. That sparked the Dons offense that would go on to score in all but three innings, including another five-run frame.
Troy Baird singled in Daniel Martinez, Jr. in the third inning before Garret Brown and Martinez each drove in a run while Nestor Linares plated Brown on an error in the the fourth inning. The Dons fifth inning nearly matched the first inning with five runs coming across with the aid of errors and wild pitches.
Cameron Baranek tripled in Frankie Nogales before eventually scoring on a wild pitch. Alex Mascarenas also scored on a wild pitch followed later by Aguilar scoring on a sacrifice fly by Linares. The final run of the inning came across when Troy Baird singled in Brown.
Brown and Martinez accounted for three runs in the sixth inning with Brown plating Baranek with a RBI-groundout before Martinez singled in Manuel Segura and Aguilar. Those would be the Dons final runs of the game.
Long Beach added three runs in the fifth inning, a run in the sixth inning and another run in the ninth inning. But the Vikings couldn't match the Dons offensive output despite compiling nine hits and six walks against the Dons four pitchers.
Those pitchers were led by starter Tyler Sloan (7-1) who picked up the win after pitching into the sixth inning. Sloan's final line was five runs, three earned, on five hits with five strikeouts in 5.1 innings pitched. Tanner Levine (0-2) took the loss after allowing six runs, four earned, on six hits in just 2.1 innings of work.
