RIVERSIDE – California Baptist University baseball put the cherry on top of its season, as it won its 40
th game of the year in its series and season finale with UC Riverside on Saturday at the Riverside Sports Complex.
The Lancers defeated the Highlanders 14-6 to secure its first 40-win season of the NCAA Division I era and the program's first since 2016. It gave CBU the series win over UCR and its ninth series win overall, as it ended the year with a 40-16 overall record, while UC Riverside wound up with a 15-35 record.
It continues one of the best-ever transitions to Division I for CBU. The Lancers continued to make a name for themselves at the highest level in 2021, as they won a share of the Western Athletic Conference title for the second time in as many opportunities.
CBU is the second team to win 40 games in one of its first two full transition seasons to Division I out of 49 teams that have made the move since 1998. It's the first time a team has won 40 games in one of the first two years of its D-I transition since Dallas Baptist won 44 games in 2004.
Russell Stevenson ended his season with a bang, as he went 5-for-5 at the plate with three runs batted in, a solo home run and a walk. It makes Stevenson just the fourth Lancer to record five hits in an NCAA-era game. It was just one hit off CBU's modern-era record for hits in a game. He's the first player with a five-hit game in Division I and the first Lancer to do it since A.J. David on March 12, 2016.
There was more history made in the season finale, as senior pitcher
Jacob McCarvel made his 26
th appearance of the year. It tied CBU's single-season record first set by Patrick Gonzales in 2016.
All nine of the Lancers starting position players combined for 18 hits in the game. Senior
Rory Smith ended his collegiate career with a 3-for-6 game game that included an RBI. Fellow seniors
Nick Plaia (three runs) and
John Glenn (RBI, run) also had hits in their final college games.
Juniors
Harrison Spohn,
Chad Castillo and
Mitchel Simon all had two hits, as well. Simon added four RBI and Spohn had two of his own.
Damon Keith also went 1-for-2 in the game with three runs scored and four walks drawn.
Ryan Silva put together a career outing to earn the win on the mound. He threw a career-high 3.1 innings and matched his career high with four strikeouts, while he held UCR to just two runs on two walks and a hit.
WHERE THE TRANSITION RANKS
Forty wins are a new single-season high for CBU in the D-I era, as well, after it won 35 games in its 2019 debut season. The Lancers have gone 75-35 over their first two full years in Division I (2019 and 2021), which is the second most wins by a program in its first two full D-I seasons.
Dallas Baptist (76-39) is the only teams to win more than 75 games through its first two full Division I campaigns out of the 49 teams who have made the move to D-I since 1998.
PLAY-BY-PLAY
The Lancers jumped out to a 3-0 lead, with a trio of runs in the third. A Plaia single and four-pitch walk to Keith put the pressure on and a sacrifice bunt from Glenn put both runners in scoring position with one out. Castillo delivered a two-run double and Stevenson capped off the inning with an RBI single.
UC Riverside tied the game with three runs of its own in the fourth inning. A back-and-forth broke out from there. Stevenson gave CBU the lead again with a solo homer in the fifth, but the Highlanders knotted the score again with a run in the bottom of the frame.
CBU took a lead for the third time on the day in the sixth. Glenn and Spohn drove in two runs with RBI singles after two walks earlier in the inning.
The Lancers turned the game on its head with a five-run seventh that gave them an 11-4 lead. CBU had five hits in the inning including a
Marty Munoz double, while Keith, Spohn, Stevenson and Simon all came through with RBI singles in the inning.
