Cal Lutheran Ends Up Short

Frustrated Cal Lutheran didn’t take care of business in the early going Saturday and failed to prevent rival Chapman from sweeping to the title at the NCAA Division III Western Regional baseball tournament.

After blasting 11 hits in a losers’ bracket victory over host Southwestern earlier in the day, the Kingsmen fell behind by seven runs in the second inning after one inning against Chapman and lost, 7-4.

“You can’t give a good team that many opportunities so early,” Coach Marty Slimak of Cal Lutheran said. “We out-scored them and out-hit them the rest of the way. We just gave a good team too many runs too early and couldn’t catch up.”

The Panthers advance to the Division III championship in Appleton, Wis., where they will open at 2:30 p.m. PDT Friday against the winner of the Mid-East Regional, which concludes today.

The Kingsmen (28-14-2) were 0-5-1 against the Panthers (31-10-1) this season but seemed poised to take charge of their final meeting after ending a 12-inning scoring drought against their Southern California rivals with three runs in the bottom of the second inning.

That made the score, 7-3, and Slimak already had ace Tom Canale on the mound in relief of freshman left-hander Justin Keeling, who made only his third start of the season.

Canale, knocked out of the box in the sixth inning of the Kingsmen’s 11-7 opening night victory over George Fox, Ore., gave up a double to Eric Albright that scored two runs in the top of the second inning, and a ground out and another double that led to two more runs.

But he scattered five hits in eight innings and got stronger as the game went on. Chapman did not get a runner to second base after the fourth.

“I thought that ball that Albright hit for a double was going to be a triple play,” Canale said of the grounder that took a strange hop as it crossed over the third base bag and ran to the screen in foul territory in short left field. “I knew my role was to keep the game close after that and our guys were going to come through.”

Well, they didn’t, in great part because Chapman also got good relief pitching.

Clint Blevins (3-0), who relieved starter Erik Maurer after the second inning, gave up a run and three hits in four innings and picked up his second victory of the tournament.

Tim Huff, with the potential tying runs at the plate in the seventh and eight innings, got the third outs on called third strikes.

Albright relieved Huff in the final inning and gave up only a one-out single.

Coach Jimmy Mallon of Southwestern raised a few eyebrows by starting No. 3 pitcher James Cunningham (5-1) in his team’s 11-5 loss to Cal Lutheran earlier in the day.

The Kingsmen pushed across two runs in the third inning for a 3-1 lead. An inning later, Tom Galante hit a three-run homer.

Southwestern made it 6-5 in the sixth inning, but Cal Lutheran got two runs in the bottom of the inning and three in the eighth.

Scott Corneya (5-0) of Cal Lutheran pitched the first five innings. David Gonzales pitched the last four and got the save.

The Kingsmen used one hit to get back into the game against Chapman. Trailing, 7-0, in the second, they loaded the bases on a single, hit batter and a walk. They scored on a wild pitch, a ground out and a sacrifice fly.