Teams Aren’t Putting All Their Hopes on Tournament

The Big West’s automatic bid to the NCAA baseball playoffs will be at stake this weekend in the conference’s postseason tournament at Cal State Fullerton, but all four teams could earn at-large berths, regardless of which team wins the title.

“This might be the strongest the conference has been in a while in terms of balance,” said Long Beach State Coach Dave Snow, a veteran of eight seasons in the Big West. “You have four very good teams, and the others all were a factor. I think all four teams should get in.”

The Big West’s 163-74 nonconference record this season supports that statement. It includes decisive advantages over the Pacific 10 (44-27), the Western Athletic Conference (37-14) and the West Coast Conference (26-12).

All four teams in the postseason playoff are ranked in the top 25 nationally this week in the Baseball America poll. That’s more than any conference except the Southeastern’s five. Fullerton (41-10) is ranked fifth despite a late-season slump that dropped the Titans to fourth in the Big West. UC Santa Barbara (32-16) is 22nd, Long Beach State (32-22) 23rd and Nevada Las Vegas (40-15) 25th.

“When you look at it, it’s hard to say that any one team must win the tournament to get into the field,” Snow said. “We have the worst record, but we also won the conference championship outright.”

Long Beach finished 15-6 in the Big West, but is 17-15 in nonconference play.

Santa Barbara boosted its stock by winning the three-game series from Fullerton, two games to one, last weekend to tie with UNLV for second, the Gauchos’ best finish since 1990. “We’ve won eight of our last 11 games, and we feel we’ve done all the things we need to do to get into the tournament,” Coach Bob Brontsema said.

UNLV Coach Fred Dallimore also points to his team’s 40-victory season, including five victories in its last six games. The Rebels also swept a three-game series from Long Beach at home in early April.

The 48-team field will be announced May 20. The regional sites will be chosen Monday. Long Beach considered bidding for a regional but decided to pass.

Fullerton, meanwhile, is the only team coming into today’s games with a fading image.

The Titans appeared to be the best team in college baseball while running up a 38-4 record, but went into a late-season nose dive in conference play, and have lost six of their last nine games.

Titan Coach Augie Garrido and his assistants met with the players Tuesday to set the focus for the weekend, and Garrido hopes it will help. “But I guess we won’t know about that until Friday night,” he said.

Fullerton comes into the tournament with the best batting average (.341) and the best pitching staff earned-run average (3.50) of the four teams, but Garrido said the Titans’ .301 average and 4.62 ERA in the last 15 conference games are more telling.

During that time, the Titans also hit into 23 double plays, an indication that they haven’t been at their best with runners on base.

“We’ve been outplayed lately, and that’s just a fact,” Garrido said. “The team that wins the tournament this weekend is going to have to play at a championship level. If we don’t play better than we have, we still might be able to get into a regional, but we won’t get out of it.”

Fullerton faces Long Beach at 7:05 tonight in the first round in the double-elimination format. UC Santa Barbara and UNLV play in the 3:05 opener at Titan Field.

The 49ers won two of three games from the Titans at Blair Field in Long Beach two weeks ago. Long Beach won the first game, 4-2, behind the complete-game pitching of sophomore Marcus Jones. Fullerton won the second game, 7-2, when Titan pitcher Scott Hild gave up only six hits and no walks over eight innings. The 49ers took the final game, 9-6, after the 49ers scored five runs in the first on a two-run homer by Jason Hodges and a three-run shot by J.J. Newkirk.

A big question looming over tonight’s game involves Jones’ health.

Jones strained a muscle in his rib cage in the second inning of his last start. He was able to continue for a complete-game 15-1 victory at San Jose State, but he had some pain early this week as a result of the injury.

Snow said he’s still hopeful Jones (9-3) will be able to start tonight’s game, but probably won’t decide until today. “I’d prefer to pitch him first,” Snow said. “He’s our best, and we think it will take our best to beat Fullerton in this situation.”

Jones has the Big West’s best ERA at 2.25 and is 6-0 with a 1.30 ERA in conference games. Long Beach’s other regular starters are Rocky Biddle (4-5, 3.83) and Steve Hueston (5-3, 3.56). Fullerton’s normal rotation has been Brent Billingsley (10-1, 2.80), Hild (8-2, 3.62) and Kirk Irvine (10-3, 3.72).

UNLV won two of three games from Santa Barbara in the regular-season series at Santa Barbara in mid-April. The Rebels won the first two games, 22-4 and 7-4, before the Gauchos avoided a sweep in the finale, 5-2.

The Gauchos have one of the conference’s top long-ball threats in David Willis, whose 16 homers rank second in the conference behind Fullerton’s Mark Kotsay with 17.

Ryan Kritscher, the Gauchos’ top hitter with a .399 average, will miss the tournament because of a fractured bone in his right hand.

UNLV has received a boost recently with the return to form of pitcher Nate Yeskie, who was bothered by arm problems early in the season. He was the top Rebel pitcher last year with an 11-5 record. The Rebels’ top pitcher has been Tom LaRosa (9-1, 3.55).