Glendale college baseball eliminated by Orange Coast
GLENDALE- Glendale Community College’s baseball team faced Orange Coast College for the third time in as many days as part of the California Community College Athletic Association Southern Super Regional with its season on the line.
In the rubber match of the three-game series at Casey Stengel Field Sunday afternoon, it was the Pirates who rose to the occasion, defeating the host Vaqueros, 7-1.
“We came out and we knew what we had to do and things just don’t fall the way you want them sometimes,” said Vaquero Nick Wolyniec, the Western State Conference South Division Player of the Year. “That is a great team we played. I mean, they won the state championship last year.”
For Sunday’s contest, both schools turned the pitching duties over to relatively untested starters and Orange Coast (25-16) rode the arm and bat of infielder-turned-pitcher Stephen Corona (2-1) to the dominant win.
“I tip my cap to the starting pitcher,” GCC Coach Chris Cicuto said. “Obviously, he is a heck of a baseball player. It’s a big compliment when you have guys who are baseball players and he is just a baseball player. He can play any position, gets after it, knows the game. He is an exceptional young man who did a tremendous job today.”
Corona, who started the season solely as an infielder before joining the pitching ranks as his teammates fell to injury, made just his fourth start of the campaign and pitched a gem in the clincher, throwing 5 2/3 scoreless innings, yielding just four hits and striking out four.
“I think [OCC] knew they had a little ace in the hole with [Corona],” Cicuto said. “I think they felt comfortable giving him the ball.”
Bucking the trend for pitchers, Corona also hit for himself on Sunday with great success. The sophomore accounted for the first run of the game by smashing a solo home run in the top of the fifth inning off of Vaqueros starter DJ Milam (3-2) that sailed down the right field line, going over the fence just inside the foul pole.
“It was a fastball inside,” Corona said. “I just turned on it and watched it fly out.”
Later, as part of a five-run eighth inning that sealed the win for the 10th-seeded Pirates, Corona, now in the role of the designated hitter, hammered a bases-loaded double off of Vaqueros reliever Ryan Losman that hugged the right field line and drove in his second and third runs batted in. Losman then gave way to Andy Frakes, who surrendered a three-run home run to James McLellan on his second pitch, pushing the margin to 7-0.
It was just Milam’s fifth start of the year and, despite taking the loss, he had a solid outing, starting with consecutive strikeouts in the first. The sophomore threw six innings, allowing a scant four hits. After Milam’s exit, the Vaqueros used five pitchers, all of whom struggled, combining to give up six runs to the Pirates in the seventh and eighth innings.
“The two starters came out and did their jobs,” Cicuto said. “I think DJ Milam was exceptional today. He’s had a bunch of different roles, from bullpen guy to set-up guy to starter. Every hat we’ve given to him he’s worn very, very well.”
Glendale (22-20), the eighth seed, avoided the shutout with a run in the bottom of the eighth. The Vaqueros prolonged the inning with a two-out error, loading the bases and bringing up Wolyniec. The sophomore hit a groundball to second base, but the throw to second base for a forceout was late, pushing a run across.
After beating the Pirates, 13-0, in the opener on Friday and racking up 15 hits, Glendale managed 13 hits and three runs in games two and three combined.
“Obviously, we are hurting a little bit over the loss here, [but] the things we’ve been able to accomplish this season with all the injuries we’ve had, we just have a great group of guys and an awesome coaching staff,” said Wolyniec, whose team had a regional win over Southwestern on top of winning its fourth Western State Conference South Division championship in the last five years. “We had the opportunities, but at certain times we just didn’t capitalize.”