Community College Baseball : Golden West Rallies to Drop Rancho Santiago

Rancho Santiago College, which had turned the Orange Empire Conference baseball race into a stumbling contest of late, finally fell out of first place Thursday.

Rancho Santiago started the day tied for first place, but Golden West rallied for two runs in the ninth to defeat the Dons, 10-9.

Cypress defeated Saddleback, 7-5, Thursday to move into first place alone with one game left.

Cypress (30-13 overall and 16-7 in the conference) is now a half-game ahead of Orange Coast (29-11-1, 16-8) and one game ahead of Rancho Santiago (26-25, 15-8), which has lost three of its past four games. The winner of the conference gets an automatic bid into the Southern California Regional playoffs.

Fullerton plays at Cypress, and Rancho Santiago is at Saddleback Saturday at noon. OCC has a bye.

Rancho Santiago took a 9-8 lead into the ninth, but Golden West got to reliever Chris Floth, who had pitched four shutout innings.

Floth got Craig Paquette, Golden West’s best hitter, to pop up to start the inning.

Josh Bammer then walked and was replaced by pinch-runner Scott Turner. Turner advanced to second on a passed ball, and scored on a single by Jeff Repoz.

Repoz stole second and scored on a single up the middle by Dan Villegas to put Golden West ahead, 10-9. Floth (0-1) took the loss.

Dave Turner retired the first two batters in the ninth, but Joey Townsend doubled to give Rancho Santiago a final chance. But pinch-hitter George Saldana grounded out to end the game.

Turner (5-3) replaced Golden West starter Toby Foreman in the sixth and didn’t allow a run in the final four innings.

“We made too many mistakes today,” Rancho Santiago Coach Don Sneddon said. “We let them get into too many situations they could take advantage of.”

Bammer had a sacrifice fly and Repoz hit a two-run home run in the first for Golden West. Marty Neff hit a three-run home in the first for Rancho Santiago to tie it, 3-3. It was the team-leading 11th home run for Neff.

Golden West scored single runs in the second and third, but Rancho Santiago scored four runs in the fourth to take a 7-5 lead.

Golden West got a two-run home run from Paquette and a solo home run from Bammer in the fifth to take an 8-7 lead. It was the 12th home run for Paquette, and the sixth for Bammer.

After Bammer’s home run, Rancho Santiago starter Willie Navarrette was replaced by Floth.

Rancho Santiago tied it, 8-8, in the fifth on an RBI double by Louie Maldonado and went ahead, 9-8, on an RBI single by Neff in the sixth.

Cypress 7, Saddleback 5--Visiting Cypress scored six runs in the second to take control. The first two came on an error, then Jason Friedman and Brett Gregory had RBI singles and Ken Kendrena had a two-run double to cap the inning. Steve Gill and Friedman had back-to-back doubles for Cypress’ final run in the sixth.

Dennis Burbank (12-4) pitched 8 2/3 for the victory. Rich Lodding got the save. Brent Ferguson hit two home runs, his fourth and fifth, for Saddleback (16-17-1, 8-14-1).

Orange Coast 9, Fullerton 4--OCC scored five unearned runs in the ninth to break a 4-4 tie at Fullerton. Marty Cordova drove in the final three runs of the ninth with triple. Jason Young had a three-run home run for Orange Coast. Eddie Pierce (4-1) got the victory. Mike Segovia had a solo homer for Fullerton (7-16, 12-26).