Community College Baseball : Griego’s 2-Hitter Stops Fullerton

Jimmy Griego threw a two-hitter and faced just 31 batters Thursday to lead Cerritos College to a 3-0 victory over Fullerton in a South Coast Conference baseball game at Fullerton.

Fullerton’s only hits were a fourth-inning single by Rod Klopfer and a seventh-inning single by Scott Einhorn.

Griego (12-2), a freshman right-hander, had two walks and seven strikeouts. He had 15 fly outs and 6 ground outs.

Alan Newman, a freshman left-hander, made his first start for Fullerton and held Cerritos scoreless through six innings although he allowed three hits, five walks, made an error, and threw three wild pitches.

Cerritos scored in the seventh inning. Robbie Grubbs singled, was sacrificed to second and scored on a single by Darrell Sherman, who later scored on a fielding error by Fullerton third baseman Deryk Hudson.

Newman (1-2) was replaced in the seventh by Jeff Petredes who worked the final 1 inning.

Hudson made another error in the ninth that led to the final Cerritos run.

“Griego pitched a great game but we helped him,” said Nick Fuscardo, Fullerton coach. “He hit a lot of good spots, but when he missed, we just waved at the ball or popped it up.”

Fullerton (27-9-1, 10-6) trails first-place El Camino (28-12, 13-4) by two games with five left. El Camino defeated Golden West, 9-7, Thursday. Fullerton is tied for fourth with Golden West.

Cerritos (28-10, 12-5) is a game behind El Camino in second and Mt. San Antonio (25-10, 11-5) is in third. The conference’s top three teams will advance to the Southern California Regional playoffs.

In the Orange Empire Conference:

Cypress 12, Saddleback 5--Steve Gill and Doug Yates both had two-run singles as Cypress (28-8, 11-4) built a 9-0 lead after three innings. Jeff Patterson (5-1) went seven innings, striking out eight, for the victory. Mike Hatch went 2 for 4 with an RBI for Saddleback.

Rancho Santiago 12, Orange Coast 5--Rich Gonzalez had three hits and four RBIs to lead host Rancho Santiago (30-6, 12-4). The score was tied, 5-5, going into the bottom of the seventh inning, but Rancho Santiago scored six runs in the inning, three on a double by Gonzales. Bob Hamelin hit his 23rd home run of the season for Rancho Santiago. Craig Washington had three RBIs and Danny Ontiveros two for the Dons.