11:30am | Both the baseball teams went East to find opening weekenders. Southern Cal brought in Jacksonville, a well regarded program in the baseball rich state of Florida, and Long Beach hosted Virginia Commonwealth, a well-connected team in the heart of the basketball rich ACC. Strong pitching (USC gave up a mere eight runs in three games) helped the Boys of Troy sweep but it took timely trickeration for LB to get a 2-1 series win.

SC skipper Frank Cruz was pleased. “Getting the sweep to start the season is nice and we’ll sure take it. We need to build on this momentum going forward and carry it into the week’s ahead.” And that would mean that the white horse and sword is coming to see old foe Long Beach who felt more relieved than excited beating the Rams two games to one. USC will start with their clutch hitting co-captain and designated hitter Brandon Garcia who already has two homers on his sheet. Garcia heads to the mound to face Long Beach lefty Nick Sabo a true freshmen who at 6-4, 210 has Steve Trachsel proportions. Garcia is a better hitter than pitcher. Last season he batted .309 (42-for-136) with six doubles, two home runs and 22 RBI…on the mound, he was 2-5 with an 8.73 ERA and one save…in 33 innings, he allowed 47 hits and 32 earned runs with 18 walks and 29 strikeouts…opponents hit .351 against him.

Of course you know that both sides will go to their respective bull pens early and often as is the rule for tender arms in February. The contest tonight opens the PAC 12 part of the 49er season, with upcoming games against Cal this weekend then upcoming tests against UCLA, Oregon and Arizona State. USC, well they don’t exactly schedule a lot of toughies, the next three are against Akron and Utah and Bakersfield with a challenging tri to North Carolina in between. Professor Troy Buckley discussed the close margins in his Blair field post game classroom Sunday; The game scores were all one run–3-2 on Sunday, 7-6 on Saturday and a 5-4 come from ahead defeat on Friday.

Perhaps the most engaging of the Dirtbags may well be Ryan Strufing, the lanky blond haired lefty from Colorado who worked the tight rope for an offensively impaired Long Beach State assemblage. Strufing used his 6.2 innings of off speed mixtures along with RBIs from Brennan Metzger, Kellen Hoime and Juan Avila to take the lead 3-2. And then, everybody exhaled as the Niners held on the rest of the way to clinch the season-opening series win over Virginia Commonwealth. For the sophomore from Niwot, CO (population 4800), Strufing loves Sundays (“I get to see all their batters and besides, it’s Sunday afternoon, what could be nicer. On Saturday the Niners shook off a disheartening a late inning 5-4 Friday night loss with a run in the eighth, and another in the bottom of the ninth. Trailing 6-5 after seven innings, the senior centerfielder Metzger tied the game in the bottom of the eighth inning after he singled was sac-ed to second in true Dirtbag fashion, went to third on a single by Jeff Yamaguchi, and scored on a sacrifice fly from pinch hitter Jonathan Kim. Good work by Kim and Hoime likely will earn them both starts in one or more of the next couple of games.

Butane Burning Dust:
 

You might not be impressed with winning two of three but then you are not a Titan or Bruin, Both teams lost two of three, the F hats from Fullerton to the F hats from Florida and UCLA to Maryland…rest of the Big West mid week work is: UC Davis at San Jose State; UCLA at Cal State Northridge; San Diego State at UC Riverside; Santa Clara at Cal Poly; Stanford at Pacific Tuesday and Oregon State vs. Pacific on Thursday…Your Wednesday game has to be squeezing in the Pyramid for Payback Part 2 vs. UCSB …payback Part 3 would have to come in the Honda Center and may be the only way to earn the coveted NCAA invite…free tee shirts to the first 3,500 on White Out night…gee my former secretary had white out weeks, but that was something to do with typing on an IBM Selectric if you are old enough to remember.. “M” as in mercy rule is that odd term used in softball and the Beach gals have been on both sides of that deal several times already this season. With their #2 ace Taylor Petty still recovering from Pneumonia; Erin Jones-Wesley has been the go-to for Kim Sowder. Not perfect but two more wins and another BWC POW because the ERA ain’t bad and the defense was. LB lost an M rule game to North Dakota State 8-0, M-ruled Indiana 13-3 and then went back on the dark side again losing an M-rule game to Portland State 12-1. This weekend the action shifts to the desert for Cathedral City Classic.