Baseball team wins fourth in a row in conference
Mar 21, 2009
The Irvine Valley baseball team has found its rhythm.
The Lasers won their fourth straight Orange Empire Conference game and got their record back to .500 with a 12-6 come from behind victory at Golden West Saturday afternoon.
Irvine Valley improved to 12-12 overall and 5-5 in conference.
"The Lasers are playing pretty good baseball right now," IVC Coach Kent Madole said.
Irvine Valley scored four runs in the top of the second to take a 4-1 lead, but gave five runs right back and trailed, 6-4, at the end of two innings.
"It was looking grim," Madole said.
Enter freshman reliever Andrew Jimenez. Jimenez followed Ryan Aguera, who started on the mound for the Lasers and then Mike Sianez, who took over for Aguera in the second.
Jimenez finished the second inning and then pitched the third, fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh innings.
He shut down the Rustlers over that stretch, giving up just one hit.
"It was a big outing by Jimenez," Madole said. "We needed him to step up and give us quality innings and that is just what he did. He showed a lot of heart, a lot of toughness and a lot of resolve."
Freshman Gary Gerhardt, who earned the win in a solid start against Saddleback on Tuesday at home, came in and closed out the game in the eighth and ninth innings.
Irvine Valley scored two runs in the top of the fourth to tie the game at 6-6 and then scored two more runs in the top of the sixth to take a 8-6 lead. Irvine Valley scored three runs in the top of the eighth to go up, 11-6, and added a run in the top of the ninth.
After having 19 hits in its win over Saddleback last Thursday at Saddleback, the Lasers finished with 18 hits against Golden West on Saturday.
Kory Burkhart and Paul Sandoval were each 3 for 5 with two RBI and Anthony Gutierrez was 3 for 5 with one RBI. Connor Rhoads, Corey Thibault, Robbie Robinson and Sean Williams each finished with two hits for the Lasers.
"Everyone in the lineup, but one player had at least one hit," Madole said. "It was great to see the whole team respond the way it did. That is the second straight game where we have come from behind to win in another team's yard."
Irvine Valley hosts Golden West on Tuesday at 2 p.m. The Lasers are also home on Thursday, hosting Cypress.