Play at Home Mirrored Year of Frustration

Jason Shanahan was face down, eating dirt at home plate. He had just been shot down for the final out as Fresno State held on for an 8-7 victory over the Cal State Northridge baseball team.

For the Matadors, it also marked the final out of the season.

Kept alive to the bitter end was the season’s enduring theme: Everything That Could Go Wrong, Did.

The final inning capped a season of frustration. With Northridge trailing by a run, Shanahan and Keyaan Cook each lined two-out singles off reliever Scott Warembourg, setting the stage for Josh Smaler.

On March 26, Smaler belted a two-run homer off Warembourg in the bottom of the ninth at Northridge to hand the Matadors a 3-2 victory. The Fresno State radio crew noted Smaler’s feat. The crowd held its breath.

Smaler came through again--almost.

He drilled a single into right field. Bryan Judice--who had four hits and has the best arm among the Bulldog outfielders--fielded the ball cleanly and came up firing.

Shanahan got the green light at third, but was tossed out by several feet at the plate.

“What do you do?” Smaler said. “You’ve got to go for it. You can’t be passive at this point. We had nothing to lose.”

Northridge (25-30, 12-12 in Western Athletic Conference play) lost its fourth game in a row and its sixth in seven. The Matadors finished below .500 for the first time since 1988, when they were 22-33.

“The whole season has been so frustrating,” Smaler said. “Just hard to believe.”

CAL STATE NORTHRIDGE

Moreno’s Moment

Steve Moreno, take a bow.

Moreno, a walk-on infielder pressed into service because of injuries to several teammates, finished the season by hitting safely in nine of his last 10 games.

“He’s the highlight of the year for me,” Northridge Coach Bill Kernen said.

Moreno, the designated hitter in the Fresno series, also caught the attention of others.

“Even (Fresno State Coach Bob) Bennett asked me, ‘Who’s this Moreno guy?’ ” Kernen said. “He’s done everything we could have asked.”

Moreno, a junior transfer from Long Beach City College, finished 11 for 49 (.224) with three runs batted in.

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Joe Hicks’ winning, personal-best throw of 60 feet 6 3/4 inches in the Flagstaff Invitational last week moved him to third place on the all-time Matador shotput list.

Hicks, a senior, improved his previous best of 59-11 to become the fourth Northridge athlete to crack the 60-foot barrier.

The others are Joe Staub (63-1 in 1979), Brian Faul (62-5 1/2 in ‘83) and Steve Albright (60-6 1/2 in ‘76).

JUNIOR COLLEGES

Desperation Time

Had the Mission baseball team managed to stretch its Southern California regional series to three games against Rancho Santiago last weekend, Free Spirit Coach John Klitsner would have been hard-pressed to find a starting pitcher.

“I don’t know what we would have done,” Klitsner said after the Dons defeated Mission, 13-10, Sunday in the second game of the best-of-three set. The third game would have followed immediately. “Is Osvaldo sitting out there?”

Klitsner was referring to Cuban defector Osvaldo Fernandez, a left-hander who pitched in one game for the Free Spirit early in the season before quitting to pursue a professional opportunity. Fernandez still hasn’t signed a contract and apparently will wait to be chosen in the June amateur draft.

Mission (26-17) used ace right-hander Ray Rivera (12-3) in an 8-4 loss to Rancho Santiago on Saturday, and Nos 2 and 3 starters Robert Ballester (6-2) and John Romero (5-5) on Sunday. Klitsner said he probably would have changed pitchers every two or three innings if the teams had played a third game.

CAL LUTHERAN

All the Right Moves

The right players were positioned in the wrong places.

Baseball Coach Marty Slimak had an uneasy feeling after the Kingsmen dropped their season opener, 9-8, in a game against Azusa Pacific early in February.

“We just didn’t look right out there,” Slimak said. “(The lineup) didn’t feel right, either.”

And so started a game of musical players:

Scott Sebbo was moved from catcher to third base; Mike Shwartzer vacated first base to take over behind the plate; John Becker was inserted into the lineup at first base; Joe Gordon switched from third base into a platoon at second base, and Ed Campaniello moved from second base to left field.

“When we made those moves, everything just clicked,” Slimak said.

Sebbo is batting .374. He leads the team with 14 doubles and is second with 45 runs batted in while committing only eight errors. Shwartzer, who attended San Diego State and Cal State Northridge before transferring to Cal Lutheran, is batting .358 and has made only four errors with seven passed balls. Becker has 10 home runs, 33 RBIs and a .362 average. Campaniello is batting .333.

“Those changes turned our season around,” said Slimak, whose team is 29- 6-1. “I’m glad we made them early.”

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Whichever team wins the best-of-five series between Cal Lutheran and UC San Diego in the NCAA Division III West Regional starting Friday will be going against the odds at the national tournament in Battle Creek, Mich., May 26-31.

No team west of the Mississippi has claimed a Division III baseball championship since Cal State Stanislaus won back-to-back titles in 1976 and ’77.

Cal Lutheran came closest to breaking that string, losing in the last inning of the championship game against William Paterson College of New Jersey in 1992. The Kingsmen also qualified for the tournament last season, but lost their first two games.

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Cal Lutheran and UC San Diego, which are among only 11 Division III baseball teams west of Colorado and play Friday in a West Regional game, usually meet during the regular season.

Not this year.

The last time they faced each other was 1992, also in the West Regional, and the Kingsmen won in four games. The first three had dramatic finishes.

Cal Lutheran won the first game, 4-3, in 10 innings; lost the second, 3-2, in 10 innings, and won the third, 8-7, in 10 innings, before winning a 12-2 blowout in the final meeting.

Relief pitcher Tim Barber, a senior, is the only holdover from that Cal Lutheran team.

Staff writers Fernando Dominguez, Steve Elling, Mike Hiserman and John Ortega contributed to this notebook.

End of the Line

When the Valley College men’s and women’s cross-country programs were dropped this week, it marked the end of a proud sports tradition at the school, particularly on the men’s side. The Monarchs won state titles in 1968, ’69 and ’70 and have produced more top-five individual finishes (16) at the state meet than any school except Grossmont (21), whose program was disbanded last year.

The following is a list, in chronological order, of Valley’s top-five finishers.

Yr Individual Place ’65 Freddy Ortega 3rd ’65 Joe Santa Cruz 4th ’68 Mark Covert 1st ’69 Mark Covert 3rd ’69 Pat Palazolla 5th ’70 Dave Babiracki 2nd ’70 Steve Brown 5th ’71 Dave Babiracki 2nd ’73 Cliff Morden 2nd ’74 Cliff Morden 2nd ’75 Gerardo Canchola 5th ’76 Kevin Burkin 3rd ’77 Kevin Burkin 3rd ’78 Chris Schallert 4th ’83 Benny Cruz 2nd* ’84 Benny Cruz 1st

*--Valley competed in the small schools division of the state championships in 1983. All other performances came in the major division race.