The Matadors answered back with a late-inning rally, scoring multiple runs to pick up a 7-4 win over Fresno State on Wednesday afternoon at Robert J. Hiegert Field. The victory ended a four-game losing streak for the Matadors, who improved to 23-20 overall on the season, while Fresno State fell to 12-29-1.<\/p>\n
The Matadors jumped ahead early in the game, but saw the Bulldogs tie it up in the fifth inning before CSUN answered back late with clutch hitting and defensive pitching<\/p>\n
Outfielder Matthew Thomas helped the Matadors jump on top in the first inning with a solo home run to open the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn baseball, you\u2019re going to go through slumps, but it was important for us today to get back on track and get a big win going into the weekend,\u201d Thomas said.<\/p>\n
During the second inning, infielder Kyle Panganiban scored on a wild pitch and infielder Trent Abel hit a home run to left field, giving CSUN a 3-0 lead.<\/p>\n
The offense came through again in the fourth inning, scoring another run on a team effort. Infielder Colton Boardman singled through the right side of the infield, and catcher Xavier Rios was hit by a pitch, putting runners on base. With two outs, Thomas doubled down the right field line, scoring a run to extend the Matadors lead to 4-0. .<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs finally struck in Fresno\u2019s fifth inning. After getting the inning started with two outs, Fresno State put runners on bases before designated hitter Mikey Boyd singled to get the Bulldogs on the scoreboard. Outfielder Marcus Nolen hit a three-run homerun to left field, tying the game at 4\u20134.<\/p>\n
After yielding the lead, outfielder Andrew Becker talked about how CSUN remained composed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe knew we could capitalize on our pitching and make big at-bats with our offense,\u201d Becker said. \u201cWe knew we had to stay focused.\u201d<\/p>\n
CSUN had the chance to take the lead in the sixth inning when Thomas doubled but the team couldn\u2019t capitalize on bringing him home.<\/p>\n
The winning run eventually scored for the Matadors in the seventh inning off of the bat of Becker. The outfielder hit a home run to left field to give CSUN the 5-4 lead.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was trying to be timely on the fastball and make an adjustment off of that,\u201d Becker said. \u201cIt worked out \u2013 I was able to recognize the pitches better and stay within my zone.\u201d<\/p>\n
CSUN tacked on insurance runs in the eighth inning. Rios singled, and outfielder Will Linberg followed with a hit to move runners into scoring position. Linberg\u2019s hit scored the sixth run on an error, and first baseman Matthew Pe\u00f1a followed with an RBI single to bring the final score to 7-4.<\/p>\n
Linberg finished the game 2 for 4. The senior outfielder was proud of how the team attacked at the plate.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe wanted to be aggressive hitters and not allow the other team to dictate what happened,\u201d Linberg said. \u201cComing off a big win like this just continues to build momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n
CSUN\u2019s offense was able to lock in after the fifth inning, utilizing at bats and scoring runs late.<\/p>\n
Pitching held down the opposition for CSUN over the final four innings, as the bullpen combined to allow just four hits and no runs over that stretch. Matador pitcher James Voorhies closed the game in the ninth, striking out the last batter to finish it off.<\/p>\n
Thomas said the victory is huge for confidence going forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it helps us substantially. We\u2019ve been struggling the past few games,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cGetting this win and building momentum going the weekend and kind of propelling ourselves into these next couple weeks that are going to ultimately decide our season.\u201d<\/p>\n
CSUN\u2019s next game will be against No. 6 Oregon State on Friday, May 1, at 5:35 p.m. at Goss Stadium at Coleman Field in Corvallis, Oregon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Matadors answered back with a late-inning rally, scoring multiple runs to pick up a 7-4 win over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":295214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-295213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}