May 7, 2006
SAN DIEGO, Calif. - The late innings proved to be a major obstacle to the Santa Clara University baseball team over the weekend as an eighth-inning rally by the San Diego Toreros capped off a 4-1 victory Sunday and a three-game sweep of the Broncos at Cunningham Stadium.
The Broncos (26-22, 7-11 WCC) will now head home for their final homestand of the 2006 season as they host the Stanford Cardinal Tuesday evening at 6 p.m. at Stephen Schott Stadium before closing out West Coast Conference play with a trio of games against the Portland Pilots. Tickets for all contests are available by calling (408) 554-4660 or by visiting the Leavey Center ticket office.
Daniel Nava closed out his hot-hitting weekend Sunday with a 4-for-5 performance while Michael Lange drove in the lone SCU run with a double in the eighth.
San Diego (30-20, 11-7 WCC) was paced by Steve Singleton's two hits and an RBI while Josh Romanski earned the win in relief for the second-straight day.
Sunday's contest remained scoreless through the first seven innings as SCU's Donald Brandt and Justin Kuehn combined to keep the Torero offense to only four hits. USD's Matt Couch, for his part, scattered six hits over six-plus innings before yielding to reliever Anthony Slama midway through the seventh.
After multiple scoring opportunities in the early going, the Broncos finally broke through against Slama in the eighth. Eric Newton led off the frame with a single to right and was sacrificed to second by Brandt. That set things up for Lange's double which gave SCU the 1-0 lead, but Slama recovered to strike out pinch-hitter Gabriel Alcantar swinging before Romanski came in and got Kevin Drever looking to end the threat.
Kuehn got the leadoff batter to ground out to start the bottom of the eighth but could not get another out as the USD bats came around. Justin Snyder hit the first of three-straight doubles in the inning with a two-bagger to left, and Singleton and Keoni Ruth each followed up with RBI doubles to give the Toreros a 2-1 advantage. A walk to Jordan Abruzzo ended Kuehn's day as Daniel DeMarco came on to try and stem the rally.
After a walk to Ryan Lilly, DeMarco got the next batter to strike out, but not before a wild pitch enabled Ruth to score USD's third run of the inning. Kevin Hansen then finished the scoring with an RBI single.
Santa Clara will now look to finish the 2006 WCC season on a winning note as they host Portland next weekend at Schott Stadium.