STANFORD, Calif. – Junior John Gavin held the No. 8 national seed Cardinal to just three hits over 7 strong innings as Cal State Fullerton (36-21) upended Stanford (41-15) 4-1 Friday night to advance the Titans to the NCAA Stanford Regional Championship Game at Sunken Diamond.
Fullerton will play the winner of Saturday afternoon's elimination game between BYU and Stanford in the nightcap at 6 p.m. It will be streamed on ESPN3. Right hander Colton Eastman (0-0, 1.86 ERA) is expected to make his 6th start of the year for Fullerton.
Gavin (7-2) needed 112 pitches to work his way to his 7th win of the year, striking out 10 Cardinal along the way. He retired the last seven batters he faced and struck out the side in his final inning of work. He also used a pair of strikeouts to escape a 5th inning jam that saw the Cardinal score their only run.
In their first postseason meeting with the Cardinal since the 2008 Fullerton Super Regional, the Titans used a balanced 10-hit attack to defeat the host and its starting southpaw Andrew Summerville (5-2), who was tagged with his second loss of the year.
Sahid Valenzuela, who finished the night 3-for-4 and a home run shy of the cycle, tripled to the left-centerfield gap to ignite a 2-run 5th inning that saw the Titans take the lead for good. Valenzuela promptly scored as Dillon Persinger punch a single into center to not only break a 1-1 tie, but also knock Summerville from the game after just 4.1 innings. The Cardinal had just cashed in a lead-off walk in the top half of the inning to even things up at 1-1.
Fullerton added their second run in the 5th to make it 3-1 as Persinger followed his single with a steal of both second an third base (his third and fourth stolen bases of the regional) and then trotted home when Taylor Bryant reached on a low-skipping throw by Stanford shortstop Nico Hoerner that went for an error.
Fullerton tacked on an insurance run in the sixth off reliever Tyler Thorne. Chris Prescott singled and swiped second to allow Valenzuela to drive him home with his third hit of the night.
For the second night in a row, the Titan bullpen was lights out. Blake Workman and Brett Conine hurled scoreless innings, earning Conine his 13th save of the season. Workman, who also spun a scoreless inning on Friday, struck out two in his inning of work.
Free passes led to the game's first runs. Fullerton got on the board in the bottom of the 2nd when Summerville issued a one-out walk to Bryant. The Titan third baseman came around courtesy of back to back singles by Hunter Cullen and Chris Hudgins.
Brandon Wulff drew a one-out walk off Gavin in the 5th and then came around to score Stanford's lone run as Jesse Kuet drove him home with a two-out single to centerfield.
Valenzuela led all players with three hits. Huggins and Timmy Richards had two. Kuet had two of the four Cardinal hits in the loss.
NOTES: Fullerton is now 120-54 in Regional action and 154-83 all-time in the postseason… Fullerton is 3-1 against the Cardinal in 2017. The Titans won the non-conference series at Goodwin Field to open up the 2017 campaign…This is the Titans' first postseason win against the Cardinal since the 2010 Fullerton regional elimination game… This is Fullerton first postseason victory against Stanford at Sunken Diamond (1997 did not face the Cardinal, 2002 lost the opener, 3-2 in 13 innings)… This is the first time Fullerton has won the first two games of a road Regional since 2007 at the San Diego Regional (USD hosted at San Diego State) – Fullerton later advanced to the College World Series that year…Conine's 13th save of the year moved him into a tie for 13th place with Vinne Pestano and Ted Silva on the single-seasons saves list…Hurst saw his 21-game streak of reaching base safely come to an end with an -for-5 night… Valenzuela (7 games), Cullen (6 games), Richards (5 games) and Hudgins (4 games) all saw their hitting streaks extended.
POSTGAME QUOTES:
Head Coach Rick Vanderhook
Opening Statement…
"That was another good ballgame between Fullerton and Stanford tonight. They've been going on for a long time and I've had the pleasure of being in a bunch of them. We just made a few more plays tonight. I thought all three of our pitchers, John Gavin, Blake Workman and Brett Conine did a great job tonight. We did a good job defensively of minimizing things. We just scored more runs than they did tonight."
On starting Colton Eastman next game…
"He's a competitor. We're going to keep him at a pitch limit because he probably has a promising young career at some point after college. It'll be hard to take the ball out of his hand when we do it, just like it was tonight with John Gavin. I was going to take him out after the sixth inning and he said no. I gave him one more out and he struck out the next three guys. Colton won't get into the 100s tomorrow, I guarantee that.
On having pitching depth…
"It's nice. I'll say that. My first year we didn't have the pitching depth, but every year since then we've had the Thomas Eshelmans the Justin Garzas of the world. When I was at UCLA we had guys like (Trevor) Bauer and Gerrit Cole. At the end of the day we still have to score more runs than the other team. That's what it comes down to. Like we told the guys, tomorrow mom and dad are going be all fired up, but for us it's just about playing another game. We're fortunate enough to be able to say we're playing anoth
er game, not a lot of teams can say that.
Junior Right-Handed Pitcher John Gavin
On pitching in front of his family and friends…
"The adrenaline was flowing. Was playing in front of a bunch of family and friends. I grew up watching Stanford baseball, so it was special. All these regional games are important. I think the second day of the regional is arguably the most important day. I was just competing out there, trying to throw strikes and just trying to give it everything I had."
Freshman Second Baseman Sahid Valenzuela
On his clutch fifth inning triple…
"I was just trying to get a pitch I could do something with. I'm just trying to put good swings together."
On his hitting approach going into the game…
"I've kept the same approach I've been having all season long. I keep it simple I just want to help my team however I can."
