CSUN Cooks Up a Record-Setting Home Run Feast

No cookie-cutter victory this.

It began with a couple of crumbs, tiny bunt singles by Adam Kennedy and Eric Gillespie that led to a scratch run in the first inning, and didn’t end until Cal State Northridge had blasted a baker’s dozen home runs, the most ever by one team in a Division I game.

The 13 home runs, the 25 hits, the 6 2/3 innings of no-hit pitching, the 29-3 score Saturday at CSUN, it all added up to the most thorough beating the Matadors have administered en route to a 19-1 record and No. 3 national ranking.

And the victim was Fresno State, three-time defending Western Athletic Conference champion, a proud program with no experience in such humiliations.

This was the most runs and hits ever allowed by the Bulldogs (6-12, 0-2 in WAC play), who are off to their worst start in Coach Bob Bennett’s 28 seasons.

“I’ve never seen anything like that,” said Northridge Coach Mike Batesole, whose team is 5-0 in WAC play. “And it will never happen again against a quality program like Fresno State.”

The power display began when Kennedy, Gillespie and Robert Fick hit consecutive home runs with two out in the second. After Jose Miranda and Grant Hohman singled, Kurt Airoso added a three-run shot that marked the first time Northridge had hit four home runs in an inning.

The eight-run second was followed by six in the third, an inning that included back-to-back home runs by Hohman and Airoso. Kennedy hit his second homer in the fourth and David Stephenson and Fick drilled two-run homers in the fifth to give Northridge a 23-0 lead.

Not that Robert Crabtree (7-0) needed such support. The senior right-hander did not allow a hit until a windblown pop fly by Craig da Luz was misplayed by Ryan Hurd in left field and fell for a double with two out in the seventh.

Batesole immediately removed Crabtree, who lowered his earned-run average to 1.37 and has allowed only 34 hits in 52 2/3 innings.

Meanwhile, the Northridge bats continued to rattle like sabers. Casey Cheshier led off the seventh with a home run and Fick hit his third, a two-run blast, with two out to tie the Division I record of 11 held by six different teams.

Fick’s second and third home runs, as well as Gillespie’s, carried over the massive scoreboard installed this season beyond the right-field wall.

Reserves got in the final blows. Second baseman Cesar Martinez, who did not start for only the second time this season because he is batting .140, opened the eighth with a home run to left-center field to set the record. Hurd, a freshman, hit his first collegiate homer two batters later.

“Everybody was having fun,” Gillespie said. “It got contagious.”

Fick drove in six runs and improved his team-high batting average to .487. Kennedy hiked his average to .400 with three hits, scored five runs and drove in three. Airoso and Cheshier each drove in four runs.

A team record was set for extra-base hits (15) and one was tied for runs batted in (29). The Matadors missed the team record for runs in a game: They defeated Southern Utah, 30-1, in 1992.

What’s left for today’s series finale? For starters, a school record for consecutive victories. The Matadors have won 14 in a row to tie a mark set in 1973.

“This was an amazing display but it’s only one victory,” Crabtree said. “It was great, but we need to come out and win another one.”

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Circuit Breaker

Cal State Northridge’s NCAA Division I record 13 home runs.

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NO. NAME INNING RUNS 1 Adam Kennedy 2nd 2-run 2 Eric Gillespie 2nd solo 3 Robert Fick 2nd solo 4 Kurt Airoso 2nd 3-run 5 Grant Hohman 3rd 2-run 6 Kurt Airoso 3rd solo 7 Adam Kennedy 4th solo 8 David Stevenson 5th 2-run 9 Robert Fick 5th 2-run 10 Casey Cheshier 7th solo 11 Robert Fick 7th 2-run 12 Cesar Martinez 8th solo 13 Ryan Hurd 8th 2-run

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