Cats down Olympians in the cold

The Saddleback baseball team braved the cold temperatures in beating San Diego Mesa College, 8-4, on Wednesday afternoon at the Saddleback Baseball Complex.  Landon Gordon pitched five shutout innings in the win.

Saddleback and San Diego Mesa moved up a game scheduled for later in the week to Wednesday to avoid wet conditions.  What they were greeted with in return was cold temperatures that dipped into the low 50's by the latter innings.

Both teams had some issues in the field as the colder temperatures and wet field conditions made things rough.  The Bobcats scored a pair of unearned runs in the bottom half of the first inning when an error on the third baseman allowed both Jacob Hudson and Matthew Henning to cross home plate for the early lead.

Mesa took a 3-2 lead in the top half of the second inning when they pieced together four hits and took advantage of a couple of wild throws over to first base.  The big blow was a double from Jr. Gonzales for the final run of the inning.

Saddleback trailed 4-2 heading into the bottom half of the fifth inning when Mesa went to its fifth pitcher in five innings.  The Bobcats took advantage of three walks in the inning, with Joey Doskocil driving in both Hudson and Andreas Nilsen with a double to center field for a 5-4 lead.

Saddleback would tack on solo runs in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings as Mesa continued to change pitchers every inning.  They used a defensive miscue from the Olympians in the sixth inning to score a run and then got a single from Jack Borges in the seventh inning to score Doskocil, who had been hit by a pitch earlier in the inning. Henning would then score on a passed ball in the eighth inning after drawing a walk and eventually advancing to third base on a throwing error from the catcher. 

Meanwhile, Saddleback turned to Landon Gordon on the mound in the fifth inning and Gordon thwarted any chances of a comeback.  He struck out three with no walks while spreading around five hits to improve to 2-1 on the season. 

Jack Borges was the star on offense, finishing 3-for-5 with a run-scored. 

Saddleback is now 8-4 to start the season.  The Bobcats are scheduled to play at Glendale College on Saturday at 3:00 PM.