Community College Baseball: Pirates fail to hold lead

HUNTINGTON BEACH — The Orange Coast College baseball team saw a golden opportunity go south at Golden West on Thursday.

The Pirates let a 4-0 lead slip away in a 5-4 Orange Empire Conference loss that dropped them into third place, one game behind the host Rustlers and two behind first-place Cypress with three conference games left.

OCC starting pitcher Art Vidrio had a no-hitter through 4 2/3 innings, before faltering, and the Pirates (20-13, 11-7 in conference), ranked No. 5 in Southern California, left 13 runners on base.

“It’s very frustrating,” OCC Coach John Altobelli said. “We jump on them early but we have no killer instinct. We let them get back in the game with sloppy defense. Then, we had a chance to do things late. We had a perfect pitch to squeeze on [in the seventh inning] and we pop it up [resulting in an inning-ending double play]. Obviously we had a golden opportunity and we kind of wasted it.”

OCC left the bases loaded in the first and fourth innings, though it scored three runs on five hits in the fourth, including a solo home run by J.T. McLellan and run-producing singles by Robert Longtree and Chaneng Varela.

A sacrifice fly by OCC’s Nick Grimes plated Stephen Corona, who had doubled to lead off the fifth inning, giving the visitors what appeared to be a commanding 4-0 lead.

But the Rustlers (20-13, 12-6), ranked No. 7 in SoCal, broke out with five singles and a walk in a three-run fifth to generate some momentum.

A one-out double, followed by an RBI single in the sixth, pulled the hosts even and Dillon Persinger singled home Gianni Castillo with the game-winner with one out in the eighth against OCC reliever Scott Serigstad, who absorbed the loss.

Vidrio allowed four runs on eight hits. The left-hander, whose 14 career victories are one behind former major league all-star Dan Quisenberry, who ranks No. 8 in OCC annals, has allowed nine runs on 21 hits in eight innings in his last two starts. Vidrio’s recent struggles followed back-to-back complete games in which he surrendered just one run and eight hits, while striking out 15 in 18 innings.

“[Vidrio] just kind of lost his mojo,” Altobelli said. “He didn’t feel comfortable throwing his fastball and he had to rely on his curveball too much. [The Rustlers] started sitting on the curveball, so they did a good job making the adjustment.”

Grimes singled, reached second on a passed ball and went to third on Chris Prescott’s sacrifice bunt in the OCC seventh. But Jeff Nellis, who was two for three with a walk at the time, popped up a bunt on a squeeze play and Golden West catcher Chris Williams snagged it and threw to third to double off Grimes.

Grimes had an infield single with two outs in the ninth and went to second on a wild pitch. But Prescott grounded out against Rustlers’ relief ace Josh Gogue to end the threat. Gogue, who recorded the final nine outs, is now 5-3 with five saves.

OCC’s conference title hopes also face extremely long odds after the loss, its fourth in its last five games. The Pirates’ last three losses have been by a combined four runs, including an 11-10 setback at Cypress on April 9 in which they blew a two-run lead in the ninth.

Grimes, Prescott and Nellis, who make up the bottom third of the OCC lineup, were a combined six for 10, while Varela and Jack Kruger were both two for five for the Pirates, who were two for 12 with runners in scoring position.

Varela doubled with one out in the OCC eighth, but Tommy Bell popped to shortstop and Kruger flew out to left field to allow Golden West to maintain the 4-4 deadlock.

Golden West, which visits the Pirates on Friday at 2 p.m., has won both games against OCC, giving it the season series win and the resulting head-to-head tiebreaker, should the two teams wind up tied.

OCC dropped two of three to Cypress.

McLellan’s line drive dinger was his team-leading third of the season.

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Orange Empire Conference

Golden West 5, Orange Coast 4

SCORE BY INNNGS

OCC 000 310 000 – 4 14 0

GWC 000 031 01x – 5 10 0

Vidrio, Serigstad (7) and Kruger; Dean, Harris (5), Gogue (7) and Williams. W – Gogue, 5-3. L – Serigstad, 4-3. 2B – Corona (OCC), Persinger (GWC), Varela (OCC), Stahl (GWC). 3B – Nellis (OCC). HR – McLellan (OCC).