Siblings Tilt Rivalry Fresno State’s Way : Baseball: Freitas brothers jar Najar, Bulldogs paste Northridge, 11-7, in WAC game.

Is this the city of brotherly love?

Cal State Northridge right-hander John Najar has had some well-documented troubles with Joseph Freitas. Now younger brother Jeremy has joined the act.

Big brother whacked a grand slam and little brother knocked in the winning run with a pinch-hit single as Fresno State held on for an 11-7 victory over Northridge in a Western Athletic Conference game Friday at Matador Field.

Twelfth-ranked Fresno State (37-15, 18-7 in conference play) clinched at least a share of the WAC Western Division title and knocked off second-place Northridge (26-25, 12-12) for the seventh time in a row.

Once again, it was Joseph Freitas, a junior, who did much of the damage. Last year Freitas hit two homers off Najar in one game. He repeated the feat earlier this season, a fact that was cryptically noted in a national baseball publication.

When Freitas stepped to the plate with the bases loaded and Northridge holding a 3-2 lead in the fifth, Northridge Coach Bill Kernen sauntered to the mound and offered this advice: “This is a big deal right here.”

Read ‘em and weep. Freitas banged the ball over the wall in right-center to give the Bulldogs a 6-3 lead, leaving Najar to explain the Bulldog outfielder’s batting stranglehold.

“Everybody and their mother knows he own me,” said Najar, who played at Fresno State before transferring to Northridge. “I got the pitch up and he did what he usually does.”

Northridge, with a postseason berth still within reach, continued to scramble. Left-hander Brendan Behn, who entered the game with an 8-4 record and a superlative earned-run average of 2.45, was bombed by the Matadors.

In the fifth, a two-run double by Eric Gillespie and a run-scoring single by freshman Adam Kennedy tied it, 6-6. After Najar gave up a solo homer in the sixth, Northridge drove Behn for cover in the bottom of the inning.

Behn, one of 40 players invited to Team USA tryouts this summer, gave up seven runs in 5 2/3 innings and left with the bases loaded and a one-run lead. On his second pitch, reliever Scott Navarro plunked Gillespie with a pitch to force in a run that tied the score, 7-7.

Navarro was yanked--the Fresno State radio corps cracked that the left-hander received a nice round of applause from the Northridge fans--and right-hander Jeff Naster was summoned.

Thereafter, all Northridge offense ceased.

Naster, a junior from Thousand Oaks High and Moorpark College, retired cleanup hitter Jason Shanahan on a fly ball to end the threat. Naster (3-0) picked up the victory with 3 1/3 innings of two-hit, scoreless ball, no small feat in the cozy Matador yard.

“I didn’t think it could be done,” Naster said, grinning. “Basically, in that situation (with Shanahan), everything comes down to one pitch. Either he gets a hit or you get him out.”

The Freitas family put the game away moments later. Joseph Freitas led off the seventh with a walk and moved to second on Matt Curtis’ single. With one out, Jeremy Freitas was called upon to pinch hit. The freshman knew his brother held the pink slip on Najar. More of same?

“Joe’s had a great year off him so far,” Jeremy said.

If not a career. Jeremy joined the action by lining a single to center to drive in his brother with the eventual winning run. Even worse, Northridge made two errors and Fresno State added three unearned runs in the inning to take an 11-7 lead.

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Matador Notes

Northridge outfielder Adam Kennedy, who has been nominated for freshman All-American honors, had two hits and has hit safely in 31 of the last 33 games. He is batting .355 and has driven in 47 runs.

Northridge catcher Robert Fick and Fresno State winning pitcher Jeff Naster were teammates on the 1992 Newbury Oaks team that won the American Legion national championship.

Northridge Coach Bill Kernen was incensed that the majority of the crowd of 566 was actively rooting for Fresno State. The infamous Red Wave strikes again.

“This is the most-embarrassing thing I’ve seen in the seven years I’ve been here,” Kernen said, fuming. “They intimidate the umps and pump up their own team while our people sit there with their thumbs in their ears. The people who have been telling me all year how to do my job sit there and don’t say peep.”

Added Fick, who had four hits: “We’ve been battling our butts off for the last two weeks and they came in and just took the place over.”

Said John Najar: “We don’t have fans, we have a couple of parents.” Appropriately or not, Sunday is Fan Appreciation Day.