Long Beach State University Athletics
Baseball begins seven-game road trip at LMU Tuesday
3/21/2011 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
March 21, 2011
Long Beach, Calif. -
Complete Baseball Release in PDF Format 
Leading Off
The Dirtbags are off for their longest roadie of the year, playing seven straight away from Blair Field. That starts on Tuesday, when the team travels up to LMU for a 3 p.m. start at Page Field. The team then heads north once more for a three-game set against Stanford beginning on Friday, March 25. First pitch for that game is scheduled for 5:30 p.m., followed by two 1 p.m. starts on Saturday and Sunday. As always all Long Beach State games can be followed via Gametracker or live audio at www.longbeachstate.com.
Beaver Dammed
Long Beach State took a 2-2 split on the week last week, first moving past Pepperdine in 12 innings courtesy of a solo home run and RBI single by Kirk Singer, winning 7-5 in the Tuesday meeting. Over the weekend, however, the Dirtbags dropped two of three to a streaking Oregon State squad. In the opener, Long Beach State found themselves on the wrong end of a brilliant pitching performance by Beaver starter Sam Gaviglio in a 4-0 defeat, and then in the first game of Saturday's doubleheader, Oregon State went with the bats in a 9-6 win that was marred by a number of Dirtbag errors. Long Beach State rallied to stop the sweep, however, getting a clutch start by Shawn Stuart, who struck out 12 batters over 6.2 innings to help get the Dirtbags to extra innings, where again the team gutted their way through for a win, a walkoff in the bottom of the 11th inning on an Ino Patron single.
Scouting LMU
Loyola Marymount has posted a somewhat surprising 13-8 record against a fairly strong schedule so far in 2011. The Lions boast series wins over both Nevada as well as two Big West teams, UC Riverside and Cal Poly, and took a game last weekend from No. 14 UC Irvine behind starter Alex Gillingham's complete game. Offensively, the Lions are led by Matt Lowenstein, who is hitting .363, while catcher Matt Koch is hitting .325 with 16 RBI and 11 doubles for LMU. The Lions took the last meeting between the teams back on Feb. 22 5-1, while Dirtbag Ino Patron had three hits including a triple. Long Beach State still leads the all-time series however, 80-46 with two ties over the history of the meetings between the two local schools.
Gagnon. Fridays.
Junior starting pitcher Andrew Gagnon has anchored the Friday night pitching role starting last year, and is having similar success this season. Despite pitching against five Top 25 opponents, Gagnon has allowed just eight earned runs all season over 27.2 innings of work., posting a 2.20 ERA that is among the league leaders in the Big West. In the season opener against Cal State Fullerton, Gagnon surrendered just two runs but ended up taking the loss to the Titans in a 2-1 defeat. The next week, however, Gagnon turned the result around, striking out seven batters while issuing no walks and scattering four hits against No. 17 Arizona in a 2-1 win. Gagnon then took another tough loss Friday against Oregon, allowing one run but taking the loss after the Dirtbags failed to score, but rallied with a "Giant" performance at AT&T Park, earning a second Big West Pitcher of the Week award after striking out six Owls over 8.0 innings in a 2-1 victory over No. 18 Rice.
Walk It Out
7-2 in one run games. 3-0 in extra innings. 3-0 in walk off games. The 2011 Dirtbags are showing toughness in the closest games, living up to the team's nickname. The most stirring examples came in the team's three walkoff victories this season. Trailing 2-0 after the first inning against USC, the Dirtbags rallied to take the lead, and then tied 4-4 in the bottom of the ninth, an RBI single by Johnny Bekakis gave the Dirtbags the win to open the week. Then in wild finish on Saturday, The Dirtbags trailed Oregon 6-1 in the bottom of the ninth, but scored five runs to force extra innings, and finally grabbed the win on an RBI single by Jeff Yamaguchi to move ahead 7-6. Finally, last weekend, the Dirtbags battled through 10 1-1 innings before a Matt Hibbert double gave the team a chance, and Ino Patron singled to score the senior and keep the Dirtbags perfect in extras this season.
Fresh Faces
With just 12 returning players from the 2010 squad, Long Beach State's team has the newest look of any squad since the original Dirtbag team under Dave Snow in 1989. Freshman Royce Murai leads the Dirtbags in hitting at .364 after securing a spot as the team's second catcher, along with transfer Mike Marjama, who is an everyday player at either third or catcher and is tied for the team lead with 18 hits. Also with 18 hits is Ino Patron, whose .295 average is third, just in front of another freshman, Jeff Yamaguchi at .286. Johnny Bekakis, Jonathan Kim, Jake Stassi and Jeff McNeil have all also had big roles as part of the Dirtbag offense while joining the team in 2011.
This and That
The Dirtbabgs' RPI is up to 31 despite the team being just one game over .500, and the strength of schedule is starting to shake out after some early inconsistencies, showing the Dirtbags at the No. 9 schedule in the nation (fullysports.com) ... Long Beach State has played just five unranked teams in 2011, going 4-1 against them, though the only loss came to Tuesday's opponent, LMU ... Stanford, after getting washed out this weekend, has now not played since March 6 ... The Cardinal get two more chances before this weekend's series with the Dirtbags ... For a program with 18 major-leaguers in 2010, the comfort level starts in college, as the Dirtbags are now 4-2 in games played in Major League stadiums.
