The men’s baseball team lost a heartbreaker to Sierra College with a final score of 5-3. The game had some costly errors from the Mustangs that led to multiple runs scoring; however, they had a short comeback that didn’t go all the way.

For the first six innings, LMC pitcher Jack Saylor only allowed three hits on zero earned runs. There was a run scored within those six innings; however, it was due to an error by Ryan Pierce in the top of the fifth inning. He called off Colton Trudeau coming in to catch the pop fly, but Pierce bobbled and dropped the ball. It looked as though Trudeau had a better angle to make the catch, but Pierce insisted he had it.

In the bottom of the first inning, the Stangs came out swinging with two straight doubles to give them a 1-0 lead. After this run, they were left quiet until late in the game. They couldn’t muster even one hit off the Sierra pitching for 7 innings. 

The first six innings turned into a pitching duel where both teams’ starting pitchers were keeping opponents to one run, but after the sixth inning, Sierra College pumped the gas and didn’t look back. Jack Saylor was taken out of the game after allowing batters to reach first and third base, but he did get 2 outs by the time he left the mound. They brought out a righty pitcher Kenny Esposito to attempt to get one out and out of the inning. However, Sierra College got a 2 RBI single that gave them a 3-1 lead.

In the eighth inning, Sierra College took a 4-1 lead after a sacrifice fly from their player. LMC went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the eighth as it was going to be their last chance to make a comeback in the ninth.

At the top of the ninth, Sierra College built their lead once again after a RBI double to make it 5-1. It was now the bottom of the ninth and the Stangs needed 4 runs to tie with 3 outs remaining.

The first two batters in the bottom of the ninth inning immediately flew out. Bubba Rocha, who was the third batter of the inning, got hit by a pitch to extend the inning. Michael Weber came up to the plate and smashed a ball to left field over the fence to cut Sierra’s lead down to 5-3. It looked like LMC was going to make a huge comeback but, unfortunately, the next batter Colton Trudeau couldn’t get on base as he grounded out to end the game. 

Throughout the game, LMC made some big base running mistakes as they went 1 for 5 on stolen base attempts and got caught leading twice. Simple mistakes gave the game away to Sierra College and they need to be fixed before their next game.

The next home game for the Stangs will be on Feb. 10, 2023, against Sacramento City College at 2 p.m. For more information on the baseball team, visit https://www.losmedanos.edu/baseball/.