Dirtbags Fall 5-2 To Vanderbilt In Season Opener

Friday, February 14

Long Beach, Calif.

6:00 PM

Long Beach State University

0-1

Vanderbilt

1-0

Vanderbilt

Long Beach State

Garrett Hampson went 2-for-4 in his Dirtbag debut.

2/14/2014 12:00:00 AM | Baseball

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Feb. 14, 2014

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LONG BEACH, Calif. - The Long Beach State Dirtbags fell 5-2 to the eighth ranked Vanderbilt Commodores in their season-opener on Friday. The Dirtbags went up early but Vanderbilt responded with five unanswered runs to take the opening game of the three-game set.

Garrett Hampson went 2-for-4 in his Dirtbag debut with a pair of bunt singles. He came around to score the Dirtbags run in the bottom of the first when Richard Prigatano was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. Prigatano also drove in the Dirtbags' second run in the ninth.

The season started off with Nick Sabo retiring the Commodores in order, followed by a Dirtbag rally in the bottom half of the first. Zack Domingues walked to lead things off and Hampson hit his first bunt single of the night to put two on with no outs. Domingues was retired at third on a sacrifice bunt attempt from Michael Hill and Ino Patron flied out as Beede nearly worked his way out of the jam.

However, Zack Rivera loaded the bases when he reached on a catcher's interference and Prigatano cashed in on the opportunity when he took a breaking ball in the shoulder to bring home Hampson. Beede ended the threat with a strikeout before the Dirtbags could do any more damage.

Sabo struck out two of the first three batters he face and struck out another in the second after giving up a single to Zander Wier. He hit Nolan Rogers with a pitch to put two on with one out. After a quick ground out, Sabo looked to have the inning finished off but a Dirtbag error allowed both runs to come home and Vanderbilt had a 2-1 lead.

Beede would go on to retire the next 13 Dirtbags he saw in order to keep Vanderbilt out in front. Sabo put together a solid outing to keep the Dirtbags in the game, allowing just one more run when Xavier Turner doubled in Chris Harvey in the fifth.

For Sabo, it was a career-long outing of 5.2 innings with five strikeouts and just one earned run but he took the loss on the mound. Beede finished with seven strikeouts in his five innings of work to pick up the win.

Turner drove in another run in the seventh to pad the Commodore lead and Vince Conde hit a sacrifice fly later in the inning.

Patron led off the ninth with a walk and later came around to score on Prigatano's grounder for the Dirtbags final run.

Five pitchers came to the mound for The Beach as they tried to keep pace with the visitors from Vanderbilt. Walker Buehler pitcher three strong innings for Vanderbilt but gave way to Brian Miller in the ninth, who finished it off.

The Dirtbags host Vanderbilt tomorrow in the middle game of their three-game series with first pitch scheduled for 2 p.m. at Blair Field.