Cal Poly to Host Fresno State for Midweek Game on Tuesday Night
4/13/2015 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
WEEKLY NOTES: CAL POLY | FRESNO STATE | BIG WEST
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SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — Cal Poly (14-18, 4-2 Big West), which moved into a tie for third place in the Big West Conference by sweeping Hawai'i over the weekend, concludes a five-game home stand Tuesday night by hosting Central California rival Fresno State (18-18, 9-6 Mountain West) for a single non-conference game in Baggett Stadium (cap.: 2,800).
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 audio and video streams are available on the baseball schedule page at www.GoPoly.com.
Cal Poly returned 19 lettermen, including six position starters and seven pitchers (three of the four starters), off the 2014 squad which posted a school-record 47 victories, claimed its first Big West Conference title and earned its third NCAA regional appearance in the last six years, hosting a regional for the first time.
And the Mustangs carried a national ranking as high as No. 13 into its opening series at Baylor, but the Bears earned 8-6, 8-6 and 6-0 victories at Baylor Ballpark, handing Cal Poly its first series sweep since the end of the 2011 campaign. After a 7-6 win over host Fresno State on Feb. 17, Cal Poly committed eight errors and was held to a .206 team batting average as Grand Canyon posted 10-4, 4-2 and 9-3 triumphs, handing the Mustangs their first sweep at home since the 2010 season (Houston).
Cal Poly has played near .500 baseball since the 1-6 start, though its entire three-game series at TCU was wiped out by a record three-inch snowfall and icy conditions at the end of February. The Mustangs earned their first series win of the year at Pacific in early March, split a four-game series against Sacramento State, won one of three games against No. 8 USC, claimed a series win at No. 19 Oregon State and won one of three games at Cal State Fullerton before avenging a 10-inning 9-8 walk-off loss at Pepperdine on March 31 with a 9-1 triumph last Wednesday in Baggett Stadium. Cal Poly swept Hawai'i over the weekend by scores of 7-5, 3-2 and 12-5, overcoming early deficits in each contest.
Fresno State has never been more than four games above the .500 or two games below the break-even line this season. The Bulldogs were 16-12 before losing six straight games, but snapped the streak with wins in the final two games of their series at home against Nevada over the weekend, including a 4-hour, 13-minute 14-10 triumph on Saturday. Fresno State owns series wins over UC Irvine, UNLV, San Jose State (all sweeps) and Nevada while losing all four games at Oregon State and UC Santa Barbara, three more at Nevada, and two of three at New Mexico and at home against UC Davis.
Cal Poly, which opened defense of its 2014 Big West title two weeks ago by winning one of three games at Cal State Fullerton, returned home and posted a 4-0 week for the first time last week with a single win over Pepperdine and three victories against Hawai'i.
Cal Poly's 2015 roster is led by junior second baseman Mark Mathias, the 2014 Big West Field Player of the Year with a .386 batting average who has earned numerous preseason All-America honors. Mathias underwent labrum surgery on his right shoulder Dec. 2 and returned to the lineup in the third week of the season as a designated hitter, going 2-for-4 with a double, one RBI and three runs scored against CSU Bakersfield on Feb. 24. Hitting .320 through 25 games with hits in each of his first 11 games, Mathias started at second base for the first time two weeks ago at Pepperdine.
Junior Peter Van Gansen returns to anchor the middle infield at shortstop while junior Brian Mundell, Cal Poly's designated hitter the last two years, takes over at first base this spring. Senior Jordan Ellis returns for another season in center field while senior Zack Zehner, drafted in the seventh round by Toronto last June, has moved from left field to right field this spring to replace Torres.
Cal Poly's pitching staff is led by junior Casey Bloomquist (12-2, 1.56 ERA a year ago), another preseason All-American, along with sophomores Justin Calomeni (8-2, 3.68 ERA) and Slater Lee (3-2, 6.20 ERA). All are right-handers. Replacing Reilly as the Mustangs' closer are senior southpaw Taylor Chris (4-1, 1.61 ERA, 5 saves), who allowed just one earned run in 27 Big West innings a year ago, and senior right-hander Danny Zandona (4-0, 3.49 ERA).
Fresno State returned 17 players, including six position starters and seven pitchers, off a team which finished 28-29 a year ago and fifth in the Mountain West Conference. Topping the list of veterans are catcher Taylor Ward (.320, six home runs, 41 RBI in 2014), senior third baseman Manny Argomaniz (.253, six home runs, 25 RBI) and junior right-hander Tim Borst (4-5, 3.02 ERA).
Left fielder Taylor Tempel leads all Bulldog hitters after 36 games with a .351 average and 11 RBI while right fielder Austin Guibor is hitting .346 with four home runs and 13 RBI. Ward has a .328 average with 11 doubles, two triples, seven home runs and 26 RBI. Fresno State is hitting .276 as a team with 21 steals in 36 attempts, has compiled a 4.22 staff ERA and has committed 45 errors in 36 games for a .967 fielding percentage.
Batesole is in his 13th season as head coach at Fresno State after seven seasons at Cal State Northridge. He is 429-344 with the Bulldogs and 686-502-1 overall. The Bulldogs have made 33 NCAA tournament appearances, including four in the College World Series and capturing the national title in 2008. The last of Fresno State's 34 conference championships was in 2012.
Cal Poly and Fresno State are meeting for the 178th time Tuesday night. The Mustangs earned a 7-6 victory on Feb. 17 at Beiden Field, jumping to a 7-0 lead and holding on. Freshman pitchers Andrew Bernstein, Michael Gomez and Kyle Smith held the Bulldogs to four singles in seven scoreless innings and Jordan Ellis singled three times, knocking in one run. The two teams did not face each other in the 2013 or 2014 seasons.
The Bulldogs own a 113-64 advantage, though the Mustangs have enjoyed some recent success. In 2005 Cal Poly swept Fresno State in a three-game series for the first time in the then-60-year history of the rivalry and duplicated the feat opening the 2006 campaign in Baggett Stadium and again in 2007 at Beiden Field. The Mustangs have won 19 of their last 25 games against the Bulldogs, including three of five games during Fresno State's national championship season in 2008.
Starting pitchers for Tuesday's game will be freshman right-hander Jarred Zill (1-1, 1.42 ERA) for Cal Poly and redshirt freshman southpaw Anthony Arias from Fairfield High School for Fresno State. Zill earned his first collegiate victory last week, tossing 5 1/3 innings against Pepperdine and allowing one run and two hits with six strikeouts. Arias likewise notched his first win as a Bulldog on March 11 against Wagner as he allowed one earned run on three hits in 5 2/3 innings in a 10-1 Bulldog victory.
Junior first baseman Ryan Drobny went 6-for-11 in the Hawai'i series with two hits in each game, doubling twice, driving in two runs and scoring four times. Sophomore catcher Brett Barbier, junior second baseman Mark Mathias and senior outfielder Zack Zehner each had four hits -- Barbier knocking in six runs, all in the Sunday contest with a single, triple and home run. The Mustangs, who hit .284 in the series and compiled a 4.00 staff ERA, were outhit by the Rainbow Warriors in the first two games but earned their first two wins in 12 games when outhit by the opposition this season.
Mundell currently sports a .337 batting average, sixth in the Big West, with five doubles, five home runs and 20 RBI. Shortstop Peter Van Gansen has a .336 average and has collected a hit in 24 of Cal Poly's 32 games, has reached base safely in 30 of 32 contests and has produced 11- and eight-game hitting streaks. Mathias has a .320 mark while Zehner sports a .282 average with five home runs and a team-leading 29 RBI in 31 games. Senior outfielder Jordan Ellis has a .298 mark with seven doubles, 11 RBI and a pair of four-hit games this season.
Cal Poly was 29-5 at home last season and has won 103 of its last 137 home games for a winning percentage of 75.2 percent. At 17-3 on March 16, Cal Poly posted the program's second-best 20-game start in its 110-year history. The 1997 Mustangs opened the year 18-2. Last year's squad also produced the school's 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.
Cal Poly has produced 12 winning seasons since 2000. The Mustangs won 32 of 43 series, including 18 sweeps, over the last three years and have the third-most victories over the last three seasons in the West Region -- 123 -- exceeded only by Oregon (138) and Oregon State (137). Last year's squad was the fourth in Cal Poly history to win 40 or more games, posting a 47-12 mark. The 1977 and 1992 Mustang squads each won 41 games while the 2013 team finished 40-19.
Cal Poly was ranked throughout the 2014 season, reaching the top 20 in all five major Division I polls after splitting a doubleheader at USC on March 2, moving into the top 10 following its 3-1 series win over Cal on March 24 and attaining a program-first No. 1 ranking by Collegiate Baseball Newspaper on April 21 after its sweep of Cal State Fullerton. The Mustangs finished Nos. 18-20 in the five polls with their 47-12 mark.
Ranked No. 13 in the Collegiate Baseball Newspaper's preseason poll, No. 23 by the NCBWA and No. 24 by USA Today/ESPN in this year's preseason polls, Cal Poly won 13 of 14 series of three games or more a year ago, including seven sweeps, split two games in a rain-shortened series at USC and won nine of its 10 midweek games, shutting out Santa Clara twice.
The Mustangs had a 12-game winning streak -- longest in a single season in Cal Poly history -- snapped in the Long Beach State series. A 14-game winning streak was compiled by the 2012 (last seven games of season) and 2013 (first seven games) squads at Cal Poly. The Mustangs were 6-3 against the Pac-12, 3-0 against the Big 12, 5-3 against the West Coast, 7-1 against the WAC and 2-0 versus the Mountain West last season.
Lee (410-302-2), in his 13th season with the Mustangs, has guided Cal Poly to 10 finishes in the upper half of the Big West standings in the last 12 years. He earned his 400th win March 7 at Pacific and surpassed Berdy Harr (297-249-6 from 1973-83) as Cal Poly's winningest head baseball coach during the Pacific series in 2011.
Cal Poly visits Central Coast and Blue-Green rival UC Santa Barbara for a three-game Big West Conference series this weekend. Game times at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium are 3 p.m. Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday and 1 o'clock Sunday.
