Long Beach State University Athletics
Long Beach State University
1-0
Rice
0-1
Espinosa Wins it in 10th for Dirtbags in Opener
2/24/2008 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Feb. 22, 2008
LONG BEACH - Danny Espinosa took the first pitch from reliever Bryan Price over the head of leftfielder Aaron Luna's head to lead No. 13-ranked Long Beach State (1-0) to a 1-0, tenth inning victory on Friday night.
Barger led off the 10th with a base hit and was then sacrificed to second base. Price then uncorked a wild pitch sending Barger to third with one out. Price then struck out pinch hitter Ted Lemasters, before walking both Chris Nelson and TJ Mittelstaedt to load the bases. Barger then scored on Espinosa's single.
Reliever Dustin Rasco (1-0) picked up the win, striking out the side in the 10th inning to keep the game scoreless in the first extra frame.
The brisk two hour and 41 minute affair was slated to be a pitching dual between Rice's Ryan Berry and LBSU's Andrew Liebel.
Liebel nearly doubled his career-high in strikeouts for LBSU, bettering his mark set last year of six, to 11 with eight shutout innings. He gave up just five hits and walked just one using 93 pitches to do so.
After walking his first batter in the seventh, Liebel got out of a first and third situation with two outs, getting a called strike three on JP Padron to keep it scoreless. Liebel retired 12 in a row in between bloop hits early on, giving up a bloop double in the first and a bloop single in the fifth.
Ryan Berry, the National Freshman of the Year last season and a member of Team USA this summer, countered with the first seven shutout innings, giving up just five hits for Rice. He walked none and struck out eight.
The Beach host Rice on Saturday at 2 p.m. and Sunday at 1 p.m.
Team Stats
Pitching:
W: Rasco, Dustin (1-0)
L: Bryan Price (0-1)
Batting:
2B: Rick Hague 2 ; Diego Seastrunk 1 ; Aaron Luna 1
Batting:
2B: Howell, Travis 1
RBI: Espinosa, Danny 1
SH: Howell, Travis 1
Base Running:
RUNS: Barger, Zach 1
SB: Tweedy, Jason 1
