Photo by: Tony Leon/ActionWestPhotography.com
WHITTIER, Calif. – The Whittier College baseball team saw their 2015 season come to a close Tuesday afternoon as they dropped to 2-2 in round robin play falling 14-9 to Occidental College.
The Poets who were coming off wins over Chapman and La Verne finish the season in seventh at 9-19, 11-28 SCIAC.
Oxy got two quick runs in the first and second innings to go ahead 2-0 but the Purple & Gold fought back in the bottom half of the third with a four spot, which included singles from Stephen Zavala (Whittier, Calif.) and Cody Martinez (Whittier, Calif.), capped off with a Chris Sekiguchi (Aiea, HI) double to right center.
But in the fifth, the Tigers broke the game open with seven runs coming on five hits and an error. Ben Cerami (Berkeley, Calif.) got two back with a two run blast to left that pulled Whittier within three, but that's as close as they would get as Oxy would bring across another three in the sixth sparked by a solo shot from Devon DeRaad.
WC would add runs in the sixth and seventh with a groundout from Graham Pimm (Clayton, Calif.) and a single from Matthew Macey (Oceanside, Calif.) and Armando Valdez (Whittier, Calif.) would get hit by a pitch in the ninth that brought in another but it wouldn't be enough to catch the Tigers as they held on for the five run victory.
Nick Garcia (Anaheim, Calif.) was tagged with the loss going 4.1 innings giving up seven runs on six hits. Zavala finished the game 3-5 with two runs scored and an RBI, while Cerami was 3-4 with two runs scored and two runs batted in.
