Cougar Baseball Splits with Cochise College

The South Mountain Community College baseball team (18-8, 12-2 ACCAC) split an Arizona Community College Athletic Conference doubleheader at Cochise College on Saturday, Mar. 7. The Cougars won the first game 4-0 behind a dominant pitching performance from Brayden Brooks but fell 10-9 in the nightcap to snap their 12-game winning streak.

Brooks (6-1) threw a complete-game, four-hit shutout in the first game. He did not allow an extra-base hit and fanned nine Vaqueros over seven innings. For the season, he owns a 2.00 ERA and 41 strikeouts in 36 innings of work.

Offensively, Holden Breeze and Efrain Cervantes produced multi-hit games. Cervantes recorded his seventh double of the season and added two RBIs to raise his season total to 19. Breeze scored two runs, and his two singles raised his season batting average to .347

Brodie Marino also hit a double, his fourth two-base hit, of the season. Davis Heller added an RBI single to give him 15 for the year.

The game remained scoreless until the top of the sixth when SMCC pushed two runs across. Cervantes doubled to plate Breeze, and Heller collected his RBI by driving in Justin Quinn with two outs.

In the seventh, the Cougars tacked on a pair of insurance runs. Ricky Munoz scored on a wild pitch, and Cervantes picked up his second RBI of the game with a single that scored Breeze.

The second game was a wild affair that saw the Vaqueros score on a walk-off hit in the bottom of the ninth. They needed that run because SMCC had rallied for eight runs over the previous three innings to take the lead.

Cochise jumped out to an 8-1 lead through four innings, working through four SMCC pitchers in that span.

The Cougars started their rally with a five-run sixth inning. With one out, Heller singled to score Dustin Bermudez, and then Easton Erwin delivered a two-run single to plate Cervantes and Quinn. JD Wadleigh then singled to score Heller, and Erwin concluded the inning's fireworks by stealing home.

In the top of the eighth, the Cougars scored three runs to take a 9-8 lead. Heller roped a double to score Quinn, Wadleigh singled to score Heller and Marino gave SMCC the lead with an RBI single to score Wadleigh.

However, Cochise responded with runs in the eighth and the ninth to take the win and snap the Cougars' winning streak.

Heller finished 3 for 4 at the plate with three RBIs, two runs and a double. Wadleigh also had a multi-hit effort, going 2 for 3 with two RBIs, a run scored and a stolen base. Quinn scored a pair of runs and had a double while Erwin had a stolen base and two RBIs.

Shawn Triplett took the loss for SMCC. Michael Sears, TJ Czyz, Derek Decolati, Damien Hernandez, Carter Krosky, Parker Wakelyn and Matt Bohnert all saw time on the hill for the Cougars in the second game.