Snow’s Strategy Shows in Victory

Only Dave Snow knows exactly what he wants from his Long Beach State baseball team, and Snow doesn’t appreciate interpretations of his vision of 49er success--seemingly informed or not.

The strategic-minded coach certainly seems to understand his guys, as evidenced by the 49ers’ long-running success. And, trust us, you don’t win five Big West Conference coach of the year awards without some special insight.

Even so, some things are so clear, and some situations so inspiring, that anyone with a ticket and a clue can surmise what Snow is thinking. Saturday night, Snow was pleased and everyone at Titan Field knew it.

Long Beach did what Snow had been waiting for, rediscovering its offense and routing Cal State Fullerton, 13-9, in a Big West Conference tournament elimination game in front of 1,420. Long Beach scored its fourth-most runs this season, and at a pretty good time.

“We were due--that’s for sure,” Snow said. “Each hitter carried confidence to the plate, and our dugout came alive with support.”

The goal was to keep playing, and the 49ers will. Top-seeded Long Beach plays second-seeded Nevada Las Vegas for the title at 1:05 p.m. today at Titan Field.

Long Beach scored nine runs in the sixth to break it open. They sent 13 batters to the plate and had nine hits. First baseman Jeff Tagliaferri provided the Titan-breaker with a grand slam.

“We had been hitting the ball pretty hard all weekend, but tonight we got the results,” Tagliaferri said. “Tonight we got the big hits and the key hits. This was really huge.”

Snow wasn’t so sure the 49ers would get here.

Runs weren’t coming easily for them in their first two games, which they split. That set up another shot against the Titans, coming 24 1/2 hours after finishing on the wrong end of a 3-1 score in a tournament opener Friday.

And trying to guess Snow’s thinking early in Saturday night’s game wasn’t hard either--or pleasant for 49er fans. The Titans led, 5-2, after two innings, and it appeared as though the conference champions might be out of hits, runs and chances.

In 23 innings to that point in the tournament, Long Beach scored five runs. Fans weren’t oblivious to Long Beach’s lack of offense, and neither was Snow.

“Our pitching has been good, and that’s what has kept us in the tournament,” Snow said. “But you have to come out of it to continue playing, because you can’t keep winning close games like this.”

And as everyone at Titan Field found out Saturday night, the 49ers didn’t have to.

“It seems like we scored more runs that inning that we did in the past couple of weeks,” Snow said. “It sure seems that way.”