The first 24 outs? No problem. But those last three outs…
 
Heading into the 9^th inning with a comfortable four-run lead, the Grand Canyon University Club Baseball Division 1 team fought off a furious rally to defeat 4^th-seeded University of California-Santa Barbara, 5-4, in Round 1 Friday of the National Club Baseball Association's Southern Pacific Regional Tournament in San Luis Obispo, California. The win moves the Lopes to the semifinal round of the four-team tournament Saturday morning.
 
For the first two-plus hours, the top-seeded Lopes had the game very much in hand. While neither team's offense was able to break through in the first four innings, GCU starting pitcher Wyatt Laub seemed destined for a historic day from the first pitch. The native of San Diego, California, not only retired the first nine Gauchos' hitters to face him, but struck out all nine – a feat he's only ever pulled off once before.
 
"Once, when I was 10 years old, I threw a perfect game over four innings, because it was stopped due to the 10-run mercy rule, and I struck out all 12 batters," said Laub. "I've never done anything like that again until today."
 
The Lopes' hitters struggled to make headway against Gauchos' staff ace Henry Manfredonia through the first three innings as well, but from the 4^th inning on, the Lopes' bats stayed hot. The Lopes left the bases loaded in the 4^th, then after a Jonah Zembik single with one out in the 5^th, Santiago Zuniga brought the Lopes' catcher home by cracking a 1-2 pitch to the left field wall for a double. After Zuniga came around to score on a passed ball, Bryce Arana capped off the inning with a 400-foot solo homer over the center field wall to give the Lopes a 3-0 edge.
 
UCSB finally got on the scoreboard in the 6^th on a hit batter, two groundouts, and a double-play ball that was thrown away to allow a run to score. The Lopes got the run right back in the bottom of the frame on a Kyo Ohsato RBI single, then added what seemed to be an unnecessary insurance run in the 8^th when Zembik hit the third single of the inning through the left side to score Braeden Coloma from second base.
 
The 5-1 edge seemed like more than enough for Laub, who cruised through the 8^th by ringing up his 15^th and 16^th strikeouts. Laub took the hill in the 9^th with 111 pitches under his belt, then ran out of gas, allowing a leadoff single from Michael Rodgers, hit the next batter, then gave up an RBI double by Grant Norman to end Laub's day. Lopes' reliever Luis Escamilla came in and gave up a Landon Ilog RBI single, then uncorked a wild pitch to score Norman from 3^rd base to cut the GCU lead to one. Then the Lopes' sophomore lefthander settled in to get a groundout to shortstop and an infield popup. With two out and Ilog at 3^rd base ready to tie the game, Escamilla got Gauchos' right fielder Jason Fritz to hit a grounder to Zuniga, who fired across to 1^st base to end the threat, give Escamilla the save, and punch the Lopes' tickets for Saturday.
 
Laub allowed just five hits and two walks to go along with his 16-strikeout performance in keeping his NCBA record perfect at 5-0.
 
"Early in the game today, I had all four pitches – my fastball, curveball, slider, changeup – working, and throwing them in any count with confidence," said Laub. "I wanted to go out and finish it, but even though I couldn't get it done, I'm glad I tried. It got a little dicey toward the end, but we're happy to get the win and some momentum going into tomorrow."
 
While the Lopes' offense never sent more than six hitters to the plate in any inning, they racked up 14 hits overall. Arana led the attack with three hits, while Zembik, Sam Ott and Koa Manintin had two hits each.
 
Now just two wins away from its 3^rd trip to the NCBA D1 World Series in the last five years, the Lopes will square off against the host team, 3^rd-seeded California Polytechnic University (who defeated #3 University of California Davis, 15-2, in their first-round matchup), in the semifinal round at 10AM Saturday. A win there sends the Lopes to the championship round of the double-elimination tournament Sunday, while a loss would force GCU to an elimination-round game Saturday afternoon.