Baseball Looks to Get Back on Track with Back-to-Back Home Games

The baseball team will look to get back on track this week with back-to-back home games. The Bulldogs are looking to snap a seven-game conference slide with a Tuesday contest against Santa Barbara and Thursday home game against Ventura. Both home games start at 2:30 p.m. The Bulldogs travel to Ventura on Saturday, March 21, for a 1 p.m. contest. Hancock starts the week 3-8 in Western State Conference action and 6-14 overall.

Hancock lost three conference games last week, a 7-2 loss at Moorpark and a tough 11-10 loss in 13 innings at home to Moorpark. The Bulldogs fell 2-0 last Saturday at Santa Barbara City College. Starting pitcher Henry Fienga threw 6 2/3 solid innings for the Bulldogs. He allowed just four hits, two runs and struck out two. SBCC's Justin Bruce limited the Bulldogs to seven hits in the complete game shutout. Justin Daraban led Hancock with two hits against the Vaqueros.

Santa Barbara starts the week tied for second place in conference at 7-4 and 14-5 overall.  The Vaqueros are ranked seventh in the Southern California Regional.

The Bulldogs welcome in Ventura on Thursday. The Pirates are 2-9 in league and 5-15 for the season.  Hancock swept two games from the Pirates to open conference play last month. Hunter Christensen had two hits and Daraban had a RBI-triple in a 5-1 victory for the Bulldogs to back five shutout innings from Fienga. Zach Lampreia, Christensen and Colby Barrick each drove in a run in a 4-0 win at Ventura last month. Elijah Ortiz earned the win with 5 2/3 shutout innings. Diego Rodriguez earned the save with 3 1/3 innings of shutout relief.

Offensively, the Bulldogs are still led by Ellis Gerussi-Turner. The shortstop is hitting .348 with four RBI and an on-base percentage of .446. Lampreia leads the team with 8 RBI.