Gauchos win shootout against Rustlers

The Saddleback baseball team ended a two-game losing streak with a 9-8 win over Golden West College in 10 innings on Tuesday in Huntington Beach.  Dan James blasted a solo home run in the 10^th inning in a marathon game that featured 25 hits and seven errors.

Saddleback entered on a two-game skid and was looking to pick up its first win in conference play after difficult losses to Santa Ana and Cypress.  The Gauchos survived, but it was anything but a beauty contest along the way.

Saddleback scored four times in the second inning to take a 4-1 lead.  Jared Donahoe started the rally by tripling home Alex King, scoring himself when shortstop Tyler Depreta misplayed a ball to allow Donahue to circle the bases.  Dylan Diaz then walked before both Dallas Dey and Brett Barker were hit by pitches, setting the table for Casey Worden.  The sophomore delivered a two-out, two-run single and the Gauchos were off and running.

Saddleback took a 6-1 lead into the bottom of the fourth inning when Golden West decided to make a game of it.  The Rustlers scored four times in the fourth, capitalizing on a Saddleback miscue in the field and sending starting pitcher Jordan Scheftz to the showers.

The game remained 6-5 until the top of the ninth inning when Saddleback looked like a team ready to put the Rustlers away.  The Gauchos scored twice in the inning, with the big hit being a two-out double by Colby Schultz to make the score 8-5. 

Unfortunately, Golden West had other ideas in the bottom half of the inning as the first two batters led off with singles.  Saddleback followed with an error by the pitcher Kyle Goodbrand, allowing Chris Williams to score and narrowing the gap to 8-6.  A pitching change brought in Domnique Key, who was quickly greeted by a single from Sean Williams to cut the lead to 8-7.  Key would settle down and retire the next two batters, but then threw a wild pitch to Philip Knapp with just one out remaining, allowing the tying run to score and sending the game to extra innings.

Saddleback looked like a team that would go down quietly in the tenth inning when Barker hit a lazy popup to short to start the inning and Worden went down looking.  James had other ideas, crushing a pitch over the fence to give Saddleback a 9-8 lead and energizing a bench that thought they were headed towards a third straight loss.   

All that was left was to see whether or not the pitching and defense could hold up its end of the bargain in the bottom half of the inning.  Freshman pitcher John Sheaks responded, forcing two lazy ground outs and a fly to left field in picking up his first win of the season. 

The win was big for Saddleback, who now stands at 10-4 overall and 1-2 in Orange Empire Conference play.  Rather than being 0-3 and in last place, the Gauchos are now just a game back of four teams in the standings with a ton of games left to play. 

Saddleback will take a trip to Riverside (13-3, 1-2) on Thursday, looking for a second straight win.  Game time is scheduled for 2:00 PM.