McGuire Walks Off the Redhawks in Conference Opener in Extra Innings

Friday, March 8

Riverside, Calif.

6:00 PM

California Baptist University

9-5, 1-0

Seattle University

4-8, 0-1

Seattle

California Baptist

Photo by: Rayleigh Rogers

McGuire Walks Off the Redhawks in Conference Opener in Extra Innings

3/8/2024 11:15:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

By: Mariah Rodriguez, Assistant Director of Athletic Communications and Digital Media

RIVERSIDE--- Friday night was one of the most exciting games yet for the California Baptist baseball team as Connor McGuire launched a home run over left field to walk off the Lancer's conference opener in the 10th inning. After taking the extra innings ball game 3-2 against the Seattle Redhawks, CBU improved to 9-5 on the season and is now 1-0 in Western Athletic Conference play.

The visiting team jumped out to an early lead in the first inning, after a sacrifice fly brought in the first run of the game to put Seattle ahead 1-0. The Redhawks held their lead until the fourth, where the squad extended their lead to 2-0 after bringing in a run off a sacrifice bunt. It was in the fifth inning that CBU answered with a Michael Carpentier RBI that brought home Josiah Chavez to cut Seattle's lead in half. Nathan Hemmerling came in the game as relief in the top of the seventh and forced a clutch double play after Seattle ground to Josh Paino, who tapped second base and threw to first for the final out of the eighth inning.

Take another look at this double play that got us out of an eighth-inning loaded bases jam😮‍💨#LanceUp⚔️ pic.twitter.com/sheoWipPYB
— California Baptist Baseball (@CBUbaseball) March 9, 2024

After Hemmerling sat down three Redhawks in the top of the ninth, Paino doubled to put himself in a scoring position for the tying run. A balk from the Seattle pitcher moved Paino to third and Julian Alvarez sent him home with a sacrifice fly that would force an extra inning. Ryan Hetzler came in to close the game in the top of the tenth and did his job well, rotating through three Redhawks with ease. It came down to McGuire, who knocked a homer off the first pitch of his at-bat over the left field wall to walk off the first game of the year for the Lancers.

Mitchel Simon, Paino, and Chavez all ended the day with a pair of hits, while Alvarez, Carpentier, and McGuire picked up an RBI. The Lancer's pitching staff combined for seven strikeouts on the day with three coming from both starting pitcher Lukas Pirko and Hemmerling. Hetzler picked up his second pitching win of the year as the Lancers turn to tomorrow to face the Redhawks again at Noon in the second installment of the conference series.