Long Beach State Rolls Over Fullerton, 13-7

Not even Brian Tokarse could slow streaking Long Beach State Saturday night.

The 49ers handed Tokarse his first loss of the season after eight victories, and extended their Big West Conference baseball winning streak to a school-record 15 in a row with a 13-7 victory over Cal State Fullerton.

It was the fourth victory for Long Beach (26-13, 16-1) in five games against the Titans this season and the second in two days at Titan Field for a team that is turning the conference’s Southern Division into a runaway. The 14th-ranked 49ers have won 20 of their last 23 games since a 6-10 start.

Fullerton fell to 22-18-1, 10-7 in the Big West, for the final game of the series at 1 p.m. today.

Long Beach pitcher Marcus Jones (7-3) won his fifth consecutive start, helped by his team’s fifth double-digit scoring spree in its last six games. But Jones wasn’t the dominant pitcher he has been in his previous four starts, giving up eight hits and five runs in seven innings.

Tokarse, who entered the game with a 1.96 earned-run average and was the winning pitcher in Fullerton’s only victory this season against the 49ers, lasted only 4 1/3 innings this time, giving up six runs, five of them earned, on six hits. Long Beach had 14 hits and was helped by five Fullerton errors.

“Putting together two big innings was the big thing for us,” Long Beach Coach Dave Snow said. The 49ers had five runs in the fifth and four in the eighth. Tokarse got off to a rocky start in the first inning and it didn’t get much better.

J.J. Newkirk, who batted in career-high five runs, hit Tokarse’s second pitch of the game over the wall in right for his third home run of the season, and Tokarse walked two batters and hit another to load the bases with one out in the first. Tokarse walked Keith Cowley, forcing in another run.

Jones gave up his first walk in 22 1/3 innings to Pete Fukuhara leading off the bottom of the first, and C.J. Ankrum’s pop fly to short right fell for a hit. The runners advanced on a bunt, and Fukuhara scored when Mike Lamb grounded out.

Long Beach picked up two more runs in the third. Tokarse gave up consecutive doubles to Chuck Lopez and Casey Martin for one run, and another run scored on Steve Doherty’s ground ball that should have been the third out. Hill fielded the ball cleanly, but Tokarse had to rush to cover the base, and the high throw went off his glove.

Fullerton came back for two runs in its half of the third when slumping Scott Seal, with only three hits in his previous 25 at-bats, had a two-run single up the middle. It followed a double by Steve Chatham, a walk to Lamb and a wild pitch by Jones, but the inning ended with the bases loaded after Jones struck out Hill and Ryan Owens.

The 49ers went ahead by six runs with the five-run fifth. Tokarse gave up two quick singles and made his earliest exit of the season since becoming a starter.

Freshman Michael Garner took over, and the 49ers squeezed in one run on Doherty’s bunt, and Garner walked in another. Two more runs scored when Izzy Gonzalez’s single to right got past Aaron Rowand, his second error of the game. Jerome Alviso’s first homer of the season, a two-run shot in the fifth, cut the Long Beach lead to 9-5, but the 49ers continued to roll with four more runs in the eighth inning.