Titans Hang on to Beat Long Beach

A four-run lead never seems big in a baseball game between Cal State Fullerton and Long Beach State.

The Titans scored four runs in the first inning, but then had to struggle for a 6-5 victory over the 49ers in the deciding game of the Big West Conference series Monday night at Blair Field in Long Beach.

The victory left the Titans (30-7, 13-2) with a 3 1/2-game lead over second-place Nevada at the midway point in the conference season.

Long Beach (18-16, 8-6) battled back to tie the score, 5-5, in the seventh inning when Greg Dobbs and Jaeme Leal delivered RBI singles, but the Titans went back on top stay in the eighth.

Aaron Rifkin’s sacrifice fly after singles by Chris Beck and Ryan Owens gave the Titans the winning run.

Strong relief pitching by Jason Berni had kept the 49ers close. Berni, who took the loss, took over in the first and gave up six hits and two runs, both earned, in 7 2/3 innings.

Titan starter Matt Sorensen went 6 1/3 innings before being replaced by closer Kirk Saarloos when Sorensen hit the second batter in the seventh. Saarloos gave up three consecutive hits, but the Titans got out of the inning with only two runs on a double play.

Saarloos walked Terrmel Sledge, the leadoff batter in the ninth. However, Sledge was stranded at third as the game ended when Saarloos got Chris Wright on an infield out after an intentional walk to Leal.

Saarloos (5-2) picked up the victory, his second of the series in relief. He gave up four hits and one run in 2 2/3 innings.

The Titans’ Spencer Oborn extended his hitting streak to 36 games with a single in the first. The Big West and Titan school record is 38 games in 1988 by Brent Mayne, now with the San Francisco Giants.

Long Beach starter Russel Rohlicek, a freshman left-hander making only his second start, walked four of the first six he faced to open the door to the four-run Titan first inning.

Oborn singled sharply to left, driving in the Titans’ first run after walks to David Bacani and Reed Johnson. Rohlicek then gave up walks to Owens and Rifkin, forcing in the second run.

Coach Dave Snow went to his bullpen for Berni, but the Titans scored two more runs before the inning ended. Catcher Craig Patterson dropped a single into short right, scoring Oborn and Owens. Patterson had been hitless in his previous 18 at-bats.

Sorensen ran into control problems in the second, hitting two batters and giving up a single to Wright that loaded the bases. One run scored on Bobby Crosby’s sacrifice fly. However, Mike Hota was called out at third on a Titan appeal for leaving second base too early on Crosby’s fly. The inning ended when Casey Grzecka grounded out.

The Titans picked up another run in the fourth. Sean Bischofberger singled, Patterson doubled, and pinch runner Robert Guzman scored when Chad Olszanski grounded out.

Long Beach scored two unearned runs in the fourth. Sorensen gave up a single to Wright, and Hota reached on a error by shortstop Chad Olszanski. Crosby’s single brought in Wright. Another run came across when Patterson faked a throw to second on a steal by Crosby, but lost control of the ball, enabling Hota score from third. The run cut the deficit to 5-3.