LOS ANGELES — The Occidental College baseball team split its home pair of SCIAC pool play games on Saturday at Anderson Field, defeating Caltech 11-1 (7 innings) and losing to Chapman in a 2-1 heartbreaker.
The Tigers move to 13-13 in SCIAC play. With two regular season games to play, Oxy is tied with Redlands in fifth, trailing La Verne by one game for the fourth-and-final SCIAC Playoff spot. The Tigers own the tiebreakers over La Verne and Redlands.
Chapman and Cal Lutheran remain tied atop the SCIAC standings at 20-6, while Caltech stays winless in conference play.
Game 1: Occidental 11, Caltech 1
The program honored its 14 seniors in a pregame ceremony, but it was freshman outfielder Devon DeRaad who stole the show against Caltech. The lefty went 4-for-4 with two home runs — one of which was a grand slam — and eight RBI. He finished a single short of the cycle.
Up 10-1 in the bottom of the seventh, DeRaad belted a solo home run over the center field wall to seal a victory via the 10-run rule.
The DeRaad-led offense gave starting pitcher Alec Strain a comfortable cushion in his final home start. He threw five innings, allowing just three hits and one run while striking out four.
First baseman Johnathan Brooks, shortstop Riley Smith, right fielder Scott Ericksen and catcher Wilson Terrall each collected a hit for Oxy.
Senior Matt Malott closed out the game with a scoreless inning on the mound.
Game 2: Chapman 2, Occidental 1
Despite a brilliant performance from starting pitcher Joseph Kling, the Tiger offense could not come up with enough clutch hits to steal a victory from the streaking Panthers.
Kling was tagged with a complete game loss in which he surrendered just one earned run on four hits.
The Tigers put some pressure on Panther starter Kevin Osaki, but the squad left the bases juiced in the bottom of the seventh when reliever Braden Riddle came in to escape the jam. The Tigers stranded 12 men on base in total throughout the contest.
Prior to leaving the bases loaded, Brooks launched a deep fly ball with Alec Strain in scoring position, down the right field line that hooked foul at the last second.
The Panthers then pushed the go-ahead run across in the top of the ninth, when Smith could not come up with a sharp groundball to his left from Panther third baseman Tyler Cook that would have ended the inning.
Tiger third baseman A.J. Libunao collected three hits, while catcher Charlie Caccamo laid down two sacrifice bunts, including a RBI on a safety squeeze, and reached on a hit by pitch and a walk.
Panther designated hitter Matt Gandy launched a homer to lead off the second, which proved Kling's only true blemish.
The Tigers return to action on Sunday at 11 a.m. at Whittier before traveling to Claremont-Mudd-Scripps on Tuesday at 3 p.m. to take on the Stags for their final pool play game.
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