Aztecs Split Doubleheader, Drop Into Tie for Second

With only series against WAC doormat Colorado State and sixth-place Air Force remaining on their conference schedule, the Aztecs entered this weekend knowing their performance against Wyoming could decide the regular-season championship.

Coach Jim Dietz set a goal of three victories in the four-game series that concludes today at 2 p.m.

“But everybody wanted four,” said pitcher Eric Plantenburg.

Now two doesn’t sound so bad.

After dropping the opener Friday, the Aztecs split a doubleheader Saturday night, winning the first game, 7-0, and losing the second, 8-4.

The split put the Aztecs at 33-19, 13-6 in the WAC, and kept Wyoming (28-14, 13-6) in a tie for second.

Entering the day, the teams were tied for first, but Brigham Young (14-5-1) swept a doubleheader from Colorado State to move into the top spot.

The Aztecs have now lost four of their past five. This after breaking into the nation’s top 25 (No. 24) for the first time in two years.

Like their first-place standing, their ranking, too, will fall.

Plantenburg took the mound for Saturday’s first game knowing the situation.

“There was a lot of pressure,” he stressed. “I really wanted to pitch good.”

By his own standards, he did not.

“Too many walks,” he said.

Yeah, right. Plantenburg walked four batters and pitched all seven innings. Maybe those four would have been too many had Plantenburg allowed timely hits. But he gave up only two--both singles. He also struck out eight, including three in a row to start the game.

Plantenburg’s Wyoming counterpart, Point Loma High graduate Rigo Beltran, was having problems. After getting the first two batters in the first, Beltran lost his control, gave up a single to Eric Christopherson, a walk to Jeff Barry, an RBI single to Anthony Johnson (Christopherson scored) and a walk to Brian Grebeck.

Beltran began the second just like he did the first--by retiring the first two batters. The similarities did not end there, because, as in the first, the Aztecs went on to score. This time they got two runs on four walks and an RBI single from Scott Dennison. Johnson got the other RBI with a bases-loaded walk.

Things continued to go the Aztecs’ way in the fifth when, with two on and none out, Mike Magruder stepped to the plate and tried to bunt runners over to third and second.

Well, he moved them along all right, but not with the plan.

“I tried to push a bunt down the first base side,” Magruder recalled. “But I pushed it foul.”

Strike one.

“Then Coach Dietz told me to square around and read the first baseman and third baseman. They were playing, in so I just tried to slash bunt it really hard, and I got it all.”

Magruder pulled back and took a three-quarter swing, and the ball didn’t drop until it cleared the fence in left center for a three-run home run, Magruder’s first of the year.

That made it 6-0. It was 7-0 an inning later when Grebeck launched one over the center-field fence, which is 13 feet high and 412 feet away.

Grebeck hit another home run to the same place in the bottom of the second inning of the second game to tie the score, 3-3.

After Scott Dennison knocked in Steve Boucher later in the inning, Wyoming came back with two runs in the fourth to move ahead, 5-4, and the Cowboys added three more in the seventh.