Orange County Community College Baseball : Tellers Shuts Down Saddleback
David Tellers pitched 6 innings of shutout relief to help Rancho Santiago College to a 14-5 victory over Saddleback Saturday in an Orange Empire Conference baseball game at Saddleback.
The victory helped ease the strain of a painful week for Rancho Santiago (10-2, 20-5), which had lost an 11-game winning streak and a two-game conference lead in the space of three days.
Rancho Santiago heads into spring break tied with Orange Coast for the conference lead with eight games left. Rancho Santiago had lost to Orange Coast by 16-4 Tuesday and by 14-12 Thursday and needed the victory Saturday to stay even with OCC, which defeated Citrus, 15-9.
Much of Rancho Santiago’s troubles last week were caused by arm injuries to starting pitchers Tellers and David Salcido. Neither could start against OCC, and Mike Anthony, who threw 141 pitches in 7 innings Tuesday, and had to pitch again Saturday.
Anthony got through the first two innings as his teammates built a 4-0 lead. Rancho Santiago scored twice in the first, then scored two more in the second on back-to-back doubles by Bob Brucato and Dave Kirkpatrick and an RBI single by Nick Santa Cruz.
In the third, Scott Swearingen lined a grand slam over the fence in left-center field off losing pitcher Todd Bush to give Rancho Santiago an 8-0 lead.
Brucato was 1 for 3 and scored three runs and Kirkpatrick was 3 for 5 and scored three runs.
Saddleback (2-9, 8-16) scored five runs in the third with the help of three walks, a pair of errors and RBI singles by Dave Shetland and Bill Lasher. Tellers replaced Anthony in the third with the bases loaded and got Chris Latham to hit into a force play to end the inning.
Tellers (7-2) gave up three hits and retired 19 of 25 hitters over the final 6 innings for the victory.
“He was throwing free of pain and that’s great for us,” said Don Sneddon, Rancho Santiago coach. “Now we can go into the break and get some people some work and get some others healthy. I was worried about this game.”
Rancho Santiago is in the Ventura tournament Monday through Wednesday.
In other Orange Empire Conference play:
Orange Coast 15, Citrus 9--Rex Peters had an RBI single and Dave Staton a sacrifice fly as the Pirates (10-2, 23-6) scored twice in the sixth to break an 8-8 tie at Orange Coast. OCC added one in the seventh and four in the eighth on a two-run double by Brent Mayne and a two-run single by J. J. Culpepper. Citrus had built an early 5-0 lead, but OCC scored six runs in the second, four on Mark Rassmussen’s grand slam. Jon Dishon (6-1) pitched 2 innings of relief for the victory.
In South Coast Conference play:
Golden West 18, Long Beach City 7--George Lazalde hit a two-run home run and Jim Buccheri a grand slam in the first inning off losing pitcher Jim Veazey (2-3) as the Rustlers (8-11, 12-13) won at home. Keith Laszlow also hit a home run in the first. Buccheri later added a two-run homer in the sixth. Long Beach City is 11-8 in conference.
Fullerton 5, Pasadena 1--Sparked by Bart Stroozas’ triple and Rod DeYoung’s double, the Hornets (15-4, 19-7-2) scored three runs in the fourth, breaking a 1-1 tie. Scott Einhorn hit a solo home run in the sixth, his second of the season. Fullerton remains one game behind Cerritos, which defeated Mount San Antonio, 1-0. Pasadena is 3-16 in conference.
