From Tuesday, March 8, to Saturday, March 12, COS Baseball played in a three-game series against Taft College. The Giants would go on to lose this series, winning only the first game.

In that first game of the series, the Giants dominated the whole way through. The Giants would score a run in each of the first six innings while putting up three runs in the third and a four-spot in the sixth.

First baseman Elijah Cortez was a standout player for COS that game. While going 2-4, he hit a three-run homer that put the Giants out of reach from Taft for the rest of the night. Center fielder Mike McKernan also went 2-4, with two RBI (runners batted in) and two runs scored.

Right fielder Jackson Brooks, shortstop Logan Schweizer, starting DH Benjamin Pederson, as well as Cortez and McKernan all had two hits in this game, with Ben having an RBI. Adding to that, third baseman Flavio Perez and second baseman Lee Trevino both added an RBI to their tallies for the game.

Meanwhile, the Giants would allow only four runs throughout the whole game. Three of those runs came off of starter Tyce Ochs, who pitched four innings and gave up seven hits along with those runs mentioned.

Cristian Garcia and Rider Hartman pitched the bulk of the remaining innings in this game, throwing a collective five innings on four hits and five strikeouts. Cole Schimpf had also come in to pitch, but after walking two and allowing the final earned run Taft would get, he would be pulled.

This would be the brightest spot of the week for the Giants before the two lackluster games that would follow in the coming days.

The game on Thursday, March 10 was the beginning of what Head Baseball Coach Jody Allen explained as bad defense being played by his whole team.

“I think we played poor defense all week, but our shortstop got hit in the hand on Thursday. It isn’t why we lost of course, but it certainly didn’t help,” the head coach said.

Even though the Giants lost 12-9 on the road on Thursday, there were some bright spots, especially when it came to scoring those nine runs on offense. Second baseman Lee Trevino, who has hit safely in 13 of his last 14 games, continued his hit parade while adding on two hits and two RBI.

DH Dominic McLaughlin, infielder Elijah Munoz, and shortstop Logan Schweizer would also add two hits, with Elijah getting two RBI and Logan getting one. Third baseman Flavio Perez would knock in two with a scorcher double for his only hit in the game, and Tyler Kiggins would also tally one more RBI.

Beyond that though, on the pitching side, there wasn’t much to be celebrated.

Jake Tye, who started the game, wouldn’t stay in for very long. After giving up four earned runs on four hits without getting anybody out, he was pulled and Austin Fleck was put in to shut it down. Fleck, Stephen Dean, and Anfurnee Murrieta would pitch the rest of the game for a collective eight innings, where they would give up 10 hits and strike out nine while giving up one home run.

In the end, partly due to the bad start from Tye and partly due to the other pitchers giving up runs in big spots, the Giants would lose the second game of the series 12-9.

In the final game of the series, defensive troubles and bat at-bats plagued the Giants on their way to an 8-4 loss, in which COS left eight runners on base total.

On the flip side of this, starting pitcher Riley Creech gave up five runs on eight hits in only 3.2 innings pitched. J.T. Friesen would come in after him and lock the game down for the next 5.1 innings, allowing no additional earned runs, but his defense behind him would allow for three unearned runs.

This was a consequence of Logan Schweizer being hurt on his hand on Thursday, as new defensive positioning would prove to be a hurdle that COS just couldn’t get over.

“Because of our shortstop getting hurt, we had to move our guy from second to short, and both of the guys in the middle had errors. Even though they haven’t played a ton in those spots but they still gotta make those plays,” Allen stated.

Those three earned runs and a lack of capitalizing on offensive opportunities would ultimately be their downfall, and some bad plate approach didn’t help them out either.

“It was very frustrating. I just feel like in the first six, seven innings, he didn’t command the breaking ball very well and we just weren’t on time with the fastball. It’s frustrating when a guy is throwing a fairly straight fastball and you aren’t on time with it, but to his credit, he located it where he wanted it and kept us off balance.”

Even though COS had a rough series this time around, the games against Reedley from March 15 to March 19 will serve as a way for the Giants to come back from two straight series losses.

“It’s tougher than it looks,” Allen concluded.

To keep up to date on all news, sports included, make sure to visit our other articles here on The Campus. To support the Giants baseball team, come out for the series finale on Saturday, March 19!

Plus, if you want to see a quick rundown of all the Giants sports, make sure to tune in to the Giants Sports Weekly, hosted by me, Spencer Beair.