LA VERNE, CA. – Head Coach Frank Pericolosi earned his 400th career win on Sunday as the Pomona-Pitzer Baseball team split their road doubleheader with Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) opponent La Verne with a 9-3 win in game one and an 8-1 loss in game two on Sunday afternoon at Ben Hines Field.
Season Impact: With the split, the Sagehens move to 6-2 overall and take the season series from La Verne with two of the three wins.
Pomona-Pitzer 9, La Verne 3
The Sagehens were led by junior Brian Knapp who went 2-5 with three runs and two RBI in the win. First-years Adrian Banales and Jack Damelio also had two hits in the win as well. Sophomore Ryan Long got his second consecutive win for the Sagehens as he went eight innings in his outing and surrendered three runs on seven hits with three strikeouts.
The Sagehens got going early against the Leopards with three runs in the first three innings. Junior Jeremy Jess got the first run of the day in the top of the first with a RBI double to left center for a 1-0 lead.
Pomona-Pitzer added two more in the third after Knapp tripled to right center and then came around to score on a wild pitched to extend the lead to 3-0.
La Verne got one run each in the bottom of the third and fourth innings to cut the lead down to 3-2 but a fielding error by the Leopards gave the Sagehens two more runs in the top of the fifth to push the lead to 5-2.
La Verne brought in one more run in the bottom of the fifth to cut the lead down to 5-3 but the Sagehens struck for three runs in the top of the sixth with RBI's from Banales, Knapp and Jess to take an 8-3 lead. The Sagehens added an insurance run in the top of the ninth with Damelio singling home Jess as the Sagehens started the road doubleheader with a 9-3 win.
La Verne 9, Pomona-Pitzer 4
The Sagehens were led by Nolan McCafferty and Jack Hanley who each went 2-4 in the loss.
La Verne jumped ahead early in game two as they plated four runs in the top of the first inning to take a 4-0 lead. Pomona-Pitzer's offense took a few innings to get on the board but managed to get one run in the top of the sixth from a Hanley RBI single to cut the lead down to 4-1.
The Leopards responded with four more in the bottom of the sixth to extend their lead to 8-1. The Sagehens tried to comeback late with RBI's from Quezada and Knapp but La Verne built too big of a lead early to preserve a win in game three.