SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Sacramento State baseball team was in it's "scoring era" on Thursday night, plating 13 runs to back senior right-hander Ethan Lay's eight shutout innings en route to a 13-1 victory over visiting Winthrop on "Taylor Swift Night" at John Smith Field.
The Hornets won their third straight game in style, improving to 9-13 overall on the season in the first-ever meeting with the Eagles, who fell to 15-7 overall with the defeat.
Winthrop suffered the fate of Ethan Lay (2-1), who faced just one batter over the minimum, retiring the first 11 straight hitters before a Corey Wouters double in the fourth, then continued to put the Eagles in a blank space by shaking off the hit and setting down the final 13 hitters he faced before giving way to Ian Winterhalder in the ninth.
In his second-longest outing of the season, Lay struck out 11 — his second-highest total of the year behind only the 13 strikeouts over 8.2 innings against Saint Joseph's back on Feb. 20. Winterhalder then pitched the ninth, giving up the Eagles' only run of the night on a hit, walking one and striking out one.
Junior outfielder Erick Dessens had an enchanted night at the plate, finishing 3-for-4 with two doubles, two runs scored, and three RBI, while freshman Sam Harry also added three hits with two more doubles with two runs scored and an RBI.
All told, seven of the Hornets' nine starters finished with hits.
Winthrop knew Sacramento State was trouble early on as the Hornets scored four times in the second on a squeeze by Michael Perazzo, a bases loaded walk to Ryan Ellis, and a two-run single from Dessens for the lead.
Single runs in the fourth (an RBI double by Dessens) and fifth (Jacob Cortez RBI ground ball) extended the lead to six and Sacramento State added two more without the benefit of a hit in the sixth on a wild pitch and a perfectly timed steal attempt by Jace Jeremiah, who held up the defense long enough to allow Luis Pimentel-Guerrero to score from third for the 8-0 advantage.
The Hornets then found daylight in the eighth, scoring five more runs thanks to bases-loaded walks to Pimentel-Guerrero and Jeremiah, an RBI single from Poturnak, a run-scoring ground ball by Sam Harry, and a sacrifice fly by Ayden Hadley.
The love story of a shutout came to an end in the ninth as the Eagles were able to plate a run on a wild pitch to cap the scoring.
Dessens extended his hitting streak to 10 straight games, while Poturnak hit safely for the eighth straight contest and Pimentel-Guerrero did so for the seventh straight game. With his walk in the sixth, Jeremiah reached base safely for the 15th consecutive contest — the longest such stretch on the team.
Sacramento State and Winthrop meet in game two of the series on Friday night (March 20) at 6 p.m. Saturday's finale has been moved up to a 1 p.m. first pitch instead of the originally scheduled 2 p.m.
