Alex Franco
Sports Editor
The CSUSM baseball team leaves no doubt in anyone’s mind that its mission this season is to win a national title.
After the Feb. 8 game vs. Chapman was delayed due to weather, the game was rescheduled to Monday Feb. 11. The delay wasn’t enough to stop them from exerting their will on visiting Chapman, beating them 3-0 to improve to 4-0 on the season.
Pitcher James Dykstra fueled the win, pitching seven innings of nearly flawless baseball, only allowing three hits, while striking out nine batters and walking none. Brandon Bentson got the cougars ahead early and gave Dykstra an early lead to work with when he belted a single to right field to bring around Mike Guadagnini for the score. The Cougars would add two more runs in the game but would only need the one run to win, as Dykstra, Frank Charlton and Hunter Brown all combined to complete the shut-out.
On Feb. 12, Chapman would return and face the Cougars once again and would put forth a better fight.
Just like the first game, Brandon Bentson got the Cougars off to an early lead in the first inning with a right field single to bring in Tyler Bernard.
Chapman would answer back in the third inning with a run of its own, to tie it up against starting pitcher Steve Messner. In the bottom of the inning, Kenny Belzer would put the Cougars up again with a 2 RBI single up the middle, and would add another run in the inning to go up 4-1. The game would continue as a back and forth affair as Chapman scored 3 runs of its own to tie the game in the next two innings.
With the game tied up 5-5 in the seventh inning, Belzer would once again come up with runners on base and give the Cougars the winning run. After an error from the left fielder, Belzer would bring around two more scores to put the cougars up 7-5. The cougars would later go on to win 9-5 and improve to 5-0 on the season.
“5-0 is a real good start for us, we played well the previous week against Concordia, and took a step back after the rain delay but important thing is we won the game,” Head Coach Dennis Pugh said. “February is our month to do well in, March and April are going to get real tough for us.”
On Friday, Feb. 15, Bethesda came to town for a double header and the cougars wasted no time making a statement. Six different pitchers made CSUSM history and combined to pitch the first no-hitter in the programs history.
Pitchers Mike Scaramella, Kevin Hilton, Addison Domingo, Jackson Gaskins, Tony Guerra and Matt Bataska all surrendered no hits to Bethesda batters.
Not to be outdone by the pitching staff, the offense of the team scored an astounding 9 runs in a 9-0 win. The Cougar offense soared thanks to Kenny Belzer who once again got the game started with a first inning 2-run home-run and ended the day with 3 RBIs. Mike Guadagnini also contributed to the success, going 2-3 with an RBI and 2 runs.
The second game of the doubleheader was more of a pitchers duel as both offenses struggled to bring any runs across the plate, going 3 and out for the majority of the game until the sixth and final at bats for the cougar offense. Tyler Bernard would score off a passed ball on the catcher to put the cougars ahead 1-0 going into the game’s final frame when Frank Charlton would close the door for the win to improve to 7-0 on the season.
“Pitching was outstanding, it’s great to be off to a 7-0 start, these were the games we were losing last season,” coach Pugh said. “Pitchers are great at getting ahead in the count early and the hitting will get better as the weather gets warmer.”
The next home game for the cougars is Friday, Feb. 22 against La Sierra at 2 p.m.