Cal Poly to Visit Bakersfield for Single Game Tuesday Night
4/14/2014 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
WEEKLY NOTES: CAL POLY | BAKERSFIELD | BIG WEST
MUSTANGS CLIMB TO NO. 3 IN FOUR MAJOR POLLS
MATHIAS, REILLY HONORED BY BIG WEST CONFERENCE
LIVE STATS | AUDIO STREAM
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. -- Cal Poly (30-5, 8-1 Big West), which has won nine series of three games or more, including five sweeps, this season and moved up to No. 3 in four of the five major NCAA Division I polls this week, visits Bakersfield (14-19, 7-5 Western Athletic) for a single non-conference Tuesday night at Hardt Field (cap.: 2,000).
First pitch is set for 6 p.m. and the game will be aired live on ESPN Radio 1280 with Tom Barket providing the play-by-play. Links for live stats as well as an audio stream are available at www.GoPoly.com.
Ranked No. 3 by Perfect Game, Baseball America, Collegiate Baseball Newspaper and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and No. 4 by USA Today/ESPN this week, Cal Poly posted its third unbeaten week of the season, going 4-0 with a 6-2 midweek win over Saint Mary's to close out an 18-game homestand and sweeping Hawai'i by scores of 3-2, 4-3 and 8-3 on the road over the weekend.
Cal Poly has won nine series of three games or more this season and split two games in a rain-shortened series at USC. The Mustangs also have won each of their five midweek games so far, including two shutouts against Santa Clara, and have not lost back-to-back games this season.
Past the halfway point of the 2014 season, the Mustangs are hitting .298 and have outscored the opposition 219-112 while the pitching staff has compiled a 2.96 ERA with 317 strikeouts and 119 walks in 310 innings. Cal Poly is No. 3 in the NCAA in strikeouts per nine innings, No. 2 in winning percentage and No. 14 in fielding percentage.
Cal Poly won 18 consecutive home games, including the final seven of the 2013 season, before Cal snapped the streak March 22. The Mustangs are 20-2 at home this season and have won 90 of their last 115 home games for a winning percentage of 78.2 percent. At 17-3 four weeks ago, Cal Poly posted the program's second-best 20-game start in its 110-year history. The 1997 Mustangs opened the year 18-2. The current squad also produced its best-ever 30-game start at 25-5, exceeding the 23-7 start by the 2009 team, 22-8 opening by the 2013 squad and 21-9 start of the 1997 club.
Bakersfield opened its 2014 season by sweeping a three-game series against Milwaukee, but then lost 19 of its next 27 games, including a 6-1 setback against the Mustangs in Baggett Stadium on April 1. The Roadrunners are 7-5 in conference games, sweeping a three-game series at home against Chicago State last weekend.
Cal Poly, 40-19 a year ago for its first 40-win season in Division I and third overall, returned 19 letter winners, including eight position starters and seven pitchers, off its 2013 squad which swept five series and won 10 of 15 weekend series.Coach Larry Lee's Mustangs went 1-2 in the Los Angeles Regional hosted by UCLA, falling to the Bruins 6-4 on the second day. UCLA went on to capture its first national title.
Cal Poly won its first seven games of the 2013 season and sprinted to a 13-1 start. Never losing more than three games in a row, Cal Poly steadily climbed 17 games over the .500 mark during the next seven weeks of play. A late-season surge with 11 wins in their last 14 games enabled the Mustangs to post their third 40-win season in school history, falling one victory shy of the record of 41 wins in both 1977 and 1992. The Mustangs finished second in the Big West for the second straight year.
Topping Cal Poly's list of returnees are senior third baseman Jimmy Allen (.299, 39 RBI) and junior relief pitcher Reed Reilly (2.29 ERA, 14 saves), both of whom were drafted last June but chose to return to Cal Poly for another season.
Also returning were outfielders Nick Torres (.333, seven home runs, 49 RBI) and Jordan Ellis (.323, 18 RBI), infielders Tim Wise, Peter Van Gansen and John Schuknecht, catcher Chris Hoo and designated hitter Brian Mundell (.265, 11 home runs, 42 RBI).
Joining Reilly on the pitching staff were starters Matt Imhof (7-3, 2.74 ERA), Casey Bloomquist (6-2, 5.02 ERA) and Bryan Granger (5-4, 5.37 ERA) and relievers Taylor Chris (1-0, 2.55 ERA) and Danny Zandona (2-1, 4.50 ERA), among others.
Bakersfield, 37-22 a year ago and 18-9 for a first-place tie in the Western Athletic Conference, returned 11 letter winners, including four position starters and five pitchers. Top returnees include infielders Oscar Sanay (.362, 45 RBI in 2013) and Mylz Jones (.333, 37 RBI) and outfielder Jordie Hein (.275, nine steals). Top returning pitchers are southpaw Taylor Aikenhead (5-2, 3.11 ERA in 2013) and righties James Barragan (0-2, 4.70 ERA) and Hayden Carter (2-3, 5.36 ERA).
Coached by Bill Kernen (sixth season, 148-160, Redlands '70), Bakersfield sports a .253 team batting average, led by designated hitter Allen Gwynn (.349, 11 RBI), second baseman Max Carter (.329, 15 RBI) and left fielder Garrett Pierce (.310, 14 RBI). The Roadrunners have compiled a 4.27 staff ERA and have committed 26 errors in 33 games for a .979 fielding percentage.
Freshman southpaw Alec Daily (1-1, 6.20 ERA) from Great Oak High School in Temecula will start Tuesday on the mound for Bakersfield, facing Cal Poly freshman righty Justin Calomeni (6-1, 3.80 ERA) (pictured above).
Bakersfield played its first season of baseball in 2009 and played its first season in the WAC a year ago. Kernen was a pitching coach at Cal State Fullerton from 1978-82, then left to take over the family's business interests when his father fell ill; after his father's passing, he returned for the 1987 season before following Titan head coach Augie Garrido to Illinois in 1988. He left Illinois for Cal State Northridge, where he was head coach from 1989-95 and posted a 240-154-3 record; he led the Matadors to the NCAA Division II title game in 1990 and a berth in the NCAA Division I regional finals in 1991. Kernen stepped away from baseball in 1995 and enrolled in the prestigious dramatic writing graduate program at Columbia University, where he wrote and produced full-length plays; he returned to baseball in 2002, serving as an assistant coach at North Carolina State. Kernen returned to Fullerton in 2007 as a volunteer assistant coach before he was hired at Bakersfield in 2008. He was a pitcher at Redlands before graduating cum laude in 1970.
Cal Poly and Bakersfield have met 16 times on the baseball field since the series began in 2009. The Mustangs hold a 12-5 advantage in the series, winning six of the first seven, capturing last year's pair of midweek games by 5-2 and 10-4 scores and posting a 6-1 win April 1, scoring six times in the seventh inning to wipe out a 1-0 deficit. Left fielder Zack Zehner was 4-for-4 in the game. Larry Lee is 12-5 against Bakersfield while Bill Kernen is 15-23 against Cal Poly, including a 10-11 mark while at Cal State Northridge from 1989-95.
Cal Poly's top hitters after 35 games are sophomore second baseman Mark Mathias (.379, 26 RBI, has hit safely in 24 of last 25 games), junior right fielder Nick Torres (.326, 11 doubles, four home runs, 31 RBI), senior third baseman Jimmy Allen (.307, 11 doubles, 26 RBI), sophomore designated hitter Brian Mundell (.320, 10 doubles, four home runs, 30 RBI, 10-game hitting streak) and senior catcher Chris Hoo (.306, 12 doubles, 27 RBI). Junior outfielder Zack Zehner (.297, eight RBI) and junior center fielder Jordan Ellis (.290, 15 RBI) are near the .300 mark.
Mathias has gone 40-for-91 (.440) during his run of hitting safely in 24 of his last 25 games, including a 17-game hitting streak snapped two weeks ago, while Mundell has lifted his average 38 points in the last three weeks by going 15-for-37 (.405).
The Mustangs have won six straight, 12 of their last 13 games and 20 of their last 22 contests. Cal Poly is 6-3 against the Pac-12, 3-0 against both the Big 12 and West Coast and 4-1 against the WAC this season.
Last week, Cal Poly reached the 30-win mark for the 10th time in the last 15 years and clinched its 12th winning season since 2000. The Mustangs are 25 games above the .500 mark for the first time in their 20-year Division I history.
Lee, in his 12th season with the Mustangs, has guided Cal Poly to five 3-0 starts with season-opening series sweeps over San Diego in 2005, Fresno State in 2006, Oklahoma State in 2012, San Francisco last year and Kansas State this season. The Mustangs have finished in the upper half of the conference standings 10 times in the last 12 years.
Lee (379-277-2) earned his 300th win on May 5, 2012, in a 12-7 decision at UC Davis. Lee surpassed Berdy Harr (297-249-6 from 1973-83) as Cal Poly's winningest head baseball coach during the Pacific series a week earlier. Steve McFarland was 290-257 in 10 seasons (1984-93) at the helm of the Mustangs while Ritch Price was 217-228-1 in Cal Poly's first eight years of play in Division I (1995-2002).
Cal Poly returns home to host four-time defending Big West champion Cal State Fullerton for a three-game series Thursday through Saturday in Baggett Stadium. Game times are 6 p.m. both Thursday and Friday and 1 o'clock Saturday.
