Community College Regional Baseball Playoffs : OCC Eliminated by San Diego Mesa

It was a simple case of teams going in different directions.

Orange Coast College came into the state community college baseball regional playoff against San Diego Mesa having lost four of its last seven games.

San Diego Mesa had finished its Pacific Coast Conference championship season with seven consecutive victories.

The Olympians made it nine straight victories Sunday, defeating the Pirates, 10-5, and sweeping the best-of-three game series, two games to none. Mesa won the first game of the series Saturday, 5-4, with two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning.

The victory advanced San Diego Mesa (33-6) to the state tournament this weekend in Long Beach.

Part of the reason the Pirates (31-10) struggled through the last three weeks of the season was injuries.

Sophomore right-hander Longo Garcia was bothered by a sore right shoulder that forced him to miss a start and come out of two others early.

Having rested for eight days, Garcia started Sunday and allowed just three runs through seven innings.

But in the eighth, he walked two batters and gave up a single with one out. Then, on a 1-1 pitch to pinch-hitter John Qsar, Garcia clutched his shoulder and was forced to leave the game because of pain. Garcia (8-2), who has signed a letter of intent to attend Cal State Fullerton in the fall, took the loss.

The OCC relievers went untested much of the season because Garcia and Sam August (10-3) completed 18 starts between them.

When tested Sunday, they failed.

Qsar hit relief pitcher Mike Rishovd’s first pitch for a single to right field to give the Olympians a 4-2 lead. Rishovd walked the next two batters, forcing in runs, and was gone.

Rishovd was replaced by left-hander John Dishon, who recorded a strikeout before giving up a three-run double to second baseman Tim Quinn, who was 2 for 5 with three RBIs. Saturday, he was 3 for 4 with one RBI.

Jay Makemson replaced Dishon to get the final out of the inning, a signal that the end of the Pirates’ season was not too far away.

San Diego Mesa scored seven runs on just four hits and six walks issued by the four OCC pitchers in the eighth inning. The staff walked 10 in the game and 17 in the two games.

“We just didn’t do the job today,” OCC Coach Mike Mayne said. “We did the same thing we did yesterday. We had our chances. The Pirates left 23 runners on in the two games and we just did not come through with the key hits.”

The Pirates mounted a minor rally in the bottom of the eighth, scoring three runs. Brett Webber had an RBI single, the other two runs came on fielders’ choices.

The rally ended when relief pitcher Eric Bridge got Joey James to pop out to third baseman Zac Valade, who made a diving catch as he and first baseman Mike Thomas ran into each other. Bridge took the place of starter Dean Wilkins (13-4), who got the victory.

James, a freshman from Newport Harbor High School, was the offensive key for the Pirates this season.

He entered the weekend hitting .464 and hit his 19th home run of the season Saturday. He set single-season school records for home runs (19) and RBIs (80).

Orange Coast, picked to finish fifth in the South Coast Conference at the start of the season, opened SCC play with 17 consecutive victories and had a 22-game winning streak that was snapped by Fullerton, 8-4, on April 26.

“You have parts of the season where you play good and parts where you play great,” Mayne said. “We played great baseball for a major part of this season. Unfortunately, we didn’t play very well towards the end, when it counts the most.”