Tritons Fall Just Short in Annual Fullerton Wood Bat Tournament
The Tritons headed north this past weekend to participate in their third annual Fullerton Wood Bat Tournament.
The Tritons opened up the tournament with an early game against ASU and had senior Andrew Hinkle on the mound to start. Hinkle held the Sun Devils for the beginning of the game but gave up a couple runs on errors and some timely hitting by the Devils. Hinkle failed to get any run support from the Triton offense as they were shut down by ASU’s opposing pitcher. Tritons ended up losing the game 8-1.
The Tritons then faced UCLA in a doubleheader and opened the game with junior Yousef Koutnik on the mound. The Tritons started hitting early and key hits by senior Nathan Domico, senior Tommy Valles, senior Shane Sudsbury, and senior Andrew Hinkle highlighted the early scoring while freshman Jared Vitug, freshman Luke Andrachek, and freshman Cameron Wilkinson highlighted the late scoring. The Tritons won behind a phenomenal effort by Yousef Koutnik who pitched 6 2/3 innings to lead the Tritons to a 13-7 victory.
The Tritons faced Cal State Fullerton in the night cap of a tripleheader on Saturday. The game started off as a pitcher’s duel between junior Kevin Nieh and the Titans starter. The Tritons were able to squeak a couple runs across behind big hits by senior Tommy Valles and junior Bobby Young to take the lead to 4-1. The Titans answered back with two runs in the sixth inning to make it 4-3 and were down one in the seventh when they stole home to tie the game. The Tritons stood off the furious rally by getting out of a bases loaded nobody out jam by junior Shane Aldas. The Tritons then answered back with 6 runs in the eighth inning to take the lead and win the game 10-4 in eight innings.
This lead to a championship game matchup with UCLA the next day which was started by sophomore Andrew Campos. Campos held the Bruin offense down to just one run over six innings. The Triton offense had plenty of opportunities to score with runners on base but grounded into double plays and squandered some key chances. The game went into the seventh inning with a 3-1 lead but the Bruins rallied back with a key two-run double with two outs to overtake the lead and held off a Triton rally in the bottom of the seventh inning to win the game and the tournament to the dismay of the Tritons.
The Tritons will take the rest of the fall season off and are looking to come back strong in January to kick off the Winter/Spring season after winter break. Hope to see you then!