Box Score
By Sean Leahy
BroncoAthletics.com
POMONA, Calif. - Behind a career day from
Jenzen Torres and a stellar outing by
Erick Ruvalcaba, the Cal Poly Pomona baseball team rolled to a big win Friday over Cal State East Bay.
The Broncos slugged 19 runs while holding the visiting Pioneer squad to just three. With the victory, CPP improves to 17-10 overall and 11-10 in the California Collegiate Athletic Association, while CSUEB falls to 8-22 overall and 6-17 in conference play.
"We wanted to put the 10-10 start in CCAA behind us," Torres said. "We know we're a better team than that and we certainly showed it offensively today."
Ruvalcaba earned the game one start for the Broncos, looking to take advantage of a Pioneer squad that entered Friday's matchup with a team batting average of just .227. The sophomore right-hander would do just that, pitching a strong eight innings and striking out nine CSUEB hitters to earn career highs in both statistics. He would give up just three runs en route to his second victory of the season.
"We always talk about keeping the other teams' rallies to one run per inning," Broncos' head coach Randy Betten said. "Erick did a great job of keeping composure and going deep into today's ballgame."
The CPP attack would jump on Pioneer starter Zach Aguirre early and would chase him out of the game with no one out in the bottom of the second inning. After scoring one run in the first on an RBI double by Jordan Whitman, the Broncos would pile on six runs in the second inning.
Aguirre walked Tyson Edwards and Allen Rodarte to lead off the second. Taylor Larson would then lay down a surprise bunt single to load the bases for Ryan Goodman. Goodman proceeded to slap a basehit through the left side of the infield to score Edwards and Rodarte, ending Aguirre's day.
Reliever Xavier De La Cruz looked as though he would get East Bay out of the jam after getting Mike Santora to groundout and Travis Taijeron to strike out swinging. However, after then walking Whitman to load the bases, the stage was set for Torres. The slugger crushed a grand slam over the left field fence to cap off the six-run second.
Torres would launch another home run off De La Cruz to lead off the fifth. The third-year catcher would add another RBI in the seventh inning on a ground out to give him a career-high of six for the game. The Broncos would tack on four more runs in the inning, highlighted by an RBI single by Goodman and a two-run double from Santora, who each had three RBI in the contest
Unfortunately for the Pioneers, CPP continued to score in bunches as the hosts would add four more runs in the seventh and three runs in the eighth. Whitman would also bring his RBI total to three with a two-run double in the seventh inning. When the dust settled, CPP had scored the most runs as a team since April 19, 2002 against San Francisco State.
The Broncos hope to have saved some runs for Saturday's doubleheader against East Bay. First pitch is scheduled for 11 a.m. at Scolinos Field.
