Orange Coast College

Baseball: Stidham's blast lifts Pirates past Tigers

Tuesday, March 03, 2009

COSTA MESA -- A lot of local frowns were turned upside down with one swing of the bat from Scott Stidham on Tuesday as the Orange Coast College baseball team rallied late for a 4-3 win over Riverside at Wendell Pickens Field.

Trailing 3-1 in the bottom of the eighth and facing an 0-2 count, Stidham ripped an off-speed pitch well past the right-field fence for a three-run home run, giving the Pirates the lead for good. In that frame, Kris Martin started things with a single to center and after a fielder's choice grounder by Drew Hillman, Brett Wallach reached on an error, putting runners on first and second.

The win not only gave Coast (10-7, 1-2 in Orange Empire Conference) its first win in the OEC, it gave the team a huge lift after dealing with the loss teammate Jourdan Watanabe this past weekend.

"It was nice to see the guys smiling again," OCC head coach John Altobelli said. "Heck, it was nice to see me smile again. Hopefully, we can build off of this and carry it into Thursday's game with Santa Ana."

Ryan Sheeks, Beck Wheeler, Scott Hong and D.J. Arellano each had two hits for the Pirates, but the offense sputtered throughout the game. Twice, OCC had a runner on second base with nobody out and failed to score and three other rallies were halted by double-play grounders.

"We're not getting productive outs -- moving guys over, bunting guys over -- that sort of thing," Altobelli said. "We had enough hits to get several runs today, but when you're struggling to score, you don't get a lot of breaks."

Sophomore Chris Licon kept the Pirates in the game with six strong innings, allowing three runs (two earned) on six hits with two walks and four strikeouts. Brett Williams picked up the win in relief (3-0) pitching two scoreless innings, while Brett Wallach earned his first save of the season with a 1-2-3 ninth inning of work.

Trailing 3-0 into the seventh, OCC finally bunched some hits together with back-to-back-to-back singles by Wheeler, Hong and Arellano loaded the bases with one out. Gary Detwiler came off the bench and delivered an RBI single to left, scoring Wheeler to make it 3-1, but the inning ended a batter later thanks to a double play.

OCC returns to action on Thursday at home against Santa Ana, beginning at 2 p.m.