By: Andrew Shortall, Director of Athletics Communications
RIVERSIDE – After playing four non-conference games last week, California Baptist University baseball will play its fifth-straight before resuming Western Athletic Conference play this week.
The Lancers open with a much-anticipated, mid-week game at Long Beach State on Tuesday before traveling to the WAC's West Division leading Grand Canyon for a three-game series Thursday, April 14 through Saturday, April 16.
CBU went 2-2 last week with a mid-week win over CSU Bakersfield and another victory on the road at Air Force. The Lancers come into this week with a 21-9 record and are 8-4 in WAC play to sit alone in second place, with Dixie State in third at 8-7.
Long Beach State went 1-2 last week, with a mid-week loss at San Diego State and 2-1 series loss at 17
th-ranked Cal Poly. The Beach is now an 15-15 on the season.
Grand Canyon continued to build momentum as it went 5-0 last week, with a two-game, mid-week sweep of fourth-ranked Texas Tech and a three-game WAC series sweep at Dixie State. The Lopes have now won six-straight games and are now 23-11 overall and 13-2 in WAC play.
CASTILLO'S CYCLE MAKES HISTORY
Chad Castillo put together a historic week for CBU as he hit .571 (12-for-21), slugged 1.095 with eight extra-base hits, including six doubles, and had a .591 OBP over four games last week. He became the first Lancer since 2006 to hit for the cycle as he went 4-for-7 with six runs batted and three runs scored in a 21-4 win over Air Force on Saturday. He had at least two hits in every game last week, with three three-hit performances. He also had a three-double game at Air Force on Friday. It earned him WAC Hitter of the Week honors for the second time this year.
ON A STREAK
David Martin comes into this week on an 11-game hitting streak. Martin has boosted his batting average to .449 and is slugging .652 with a .561 on-base percentage.
Harrison Spohn and
Chad Castillo have each hit safely over the last six games for the Lancers.
WHERE CBU'S TRANSITION RANKS
The Lancers are 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. Forty wins are a new single-season high for CBU in the D-I era after it won 35 games in 2019. The Lancers are 96-45 over their first three full years in Division I (2019, 2021-22), which is already tied for the third most wins by a program in its first three full D-I seasons.
Overall, CBU has gone 103-53 in Division I seasons. Its win total is five games off top-10 standing among first-year Division I teams since 1998, despite the 2020 season being canceled just 15 games in due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lancers' 66.0 winning percentage ranks first among transitioning D1 programs, with Stony Brook (64.7, 112-61); Florida Gulf Coast (63.1, 139-81) and Dallas Baptist (61.2, 139-88) being the only teams to win at least 110 games at 60-percent clip or higher.
LBSU SERIES NOTES
This meeting between CBU and the Dirtbags is a long time in the making. The two were originally scheduled to face each other twice, but both games were canceled along with the rest of the season due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lancers are playing seven first-time foes this season, with Long Beach State being the last.
GAME INFORMATION
Opponent: Long Beach State
Date/Time: Tuesday, April 12 (6 p.m.)
Location: Long Beach, Calif. (Bohl Diamond at Blair Field)
CBU Radio: Sidearm
Video: ESPN+
Live Stats: StatBroadcast
DIRTBAGS AT A GLANCE
Long Beach State is a storied baseball power in Southern California. The Beach has won nine Big West championships, made 22 NCAA Tournament appearances and advanced to the College World Series four times and is coming off a third-place finish in the Big West Conference last year.
The Dirtbags named Eric Valenzuela the eighth head coach in the history of the program in June of 2019. He replaced Troy Buckley, who led Long Beach for nine seasons.
Long Beach State made an immediate statement this season when it won its opening three-game series at third-ranked Mississippi State. The Dirtbags have gone on to secure three more ranked wins, with a 2-1 series victory over No. 15 Gonzaga and a 28-2 win at No. 17 Cal Poly.
Offensively, LBSU is hitting .287, slugging .416 and has a .370 on-base percentage. Eight Dirtbags are coming into the game hitting .300 or better. Tanner Carlson is the unrivaled leader at the plate with a .406 batting average, .522 slugging percentage and .461 OBP. Rocco Peppi (.345), Sebastian Murillo (.333), Chase Luttrell (.328), Jonathon Long (.315), Chris Jimenez (.309), Peyton Schulze (.304) and Tyler Porter (.300) are all hitting at a .300 clip, as well.
The pitching staff has a 3.67 earned-run average, 1.22 WHIP, .232 batting average against and four shutouts this season. Matt Fields has made a team-high 11 appearances and is the closer with three saves, a 1.47 ERA, 0.65 WHIP and .154 BAA. Marques Johnson has also made 10 appearances, primarily in relief. Four other pitchers have made nine appearances and another four have made eight. Devereaux Harrison is one of those six pitchers and has two saves to his credit.
GCU SERIES NOTES
Grand Canyon is CBU's most familiar foe in the WAC, as the two were conference foes in the PacWest in 2012 and 2013. The Lopes own a 71-16-1 advantage in the all-time series, which began in 1967, but CBU has gone 13-11 versus Grand Canyon in the
Gary Adcock era since the series picked back up in 2005.
The first series between these two was swept by GCU in Riverside. The Lancers' last trip to Brazell Field in 2021 was evenly split, with CBU winning the second (5-3) and final game of the series (6-1) to clinch a share of the WAC regular-season title with the Lopes.
The Lancers won their first-ever WAC series with GCU in Arizona in 2019, with 8-0 and 4-1 wins in the final two games after GCU took the opener, 3-0. It ended the Lopes' 17 conference series winning streak in the WAC, the longest such streak in the nation at that point.
CBU also went 8-4 against the Lopes in the PacWest era. GCU dominated the series early on, going 60-3-1 over the first 64 games in the series played from 1967 to 1983. It was 18 years until the two met again in 2005.
SERIES INFORMATION
Opponent: Grand Canyon
Date/Time: Thursday, April 14 (6 p.m.); Friday, April 15 (6 p.m.); Saturday, April 16 (12 p.m.)
Location: Phoenix (Brazell Field)
CBU Radio: Sidearm:
Game 1 |
Game 2 |
Game 3
Video: ESPN+:
Game 1 |
Game 2 |
Game 3
Live Stats: StatBroadcast:
Game 1 |
Game 2 |
Game 3
LOPES AT A GLANCE
Grand Canyon has continued to impress against top competition this year, with the two wins over No. 4 Texas Tech and a victory and one-run loss to No. 5 Oregon State, a two-run loss to No. 15 Arizona and a 7-5 win over Arizona State.
The Lopes have are hitting .300, slugging .462 and maintain a .380 on-base percentage. As a pitching staff, the Lopes have a 3.70 earned-run average, 1.30 WHIP and .252 batting average against.
Offensively, Grand Canyon has six regular players hitting above .300. Juan Colato (.383) and
Jacob Wilson (.382) are both hitting above .380. Tyler Wilson (.325), Elijah Buries (.324), Adrian Torres (.311) and Homer Bush Jr. (.315) all hit above .300, as well.
Nick Hull is the pitching staff ace with a 2.30 ERA, 1.02 WHIP and .214 BAA over a team-high eight starts. Carter Young and Connor Markl have both started a team-high seven games on the mound this year, but Hunter Omlid and Daniel Avita have started at least four games, as well.
Vince Reilly is the team's closer with nine saves and 17 appearances. Eli Ankeney has also made 15 appearances and has a 1.14 ERA, 0.85 WHIP and .157 BAA.
