Vidrio, Pabich lead Pirates past Palomar, 3-0, to reach state title game!

FRESNO -- The Orange Coast College baseball team is showing the rest of the community college baseball world that being great all season isn't as important as being great at the right time.

Fresh off an incredible pitching performance from Dominic Purpura in Saturday's opener, sophomore lefty Art Vidrio and freshman righty Jack Pabich continued putting zeroes on the scoreboard as the never-say-die Pirates upset Palomar, 3-0, on Sunday, putting Coast (29-17) into the championship game of the California Community College Athletic Association State Baseball Championship, set for Monday at 11 a.m. at Fresno City College's John Euless Ballpark.

Vidrio (9-3) held the nation's No. 2 ranked Comets (37-7) to just four hits, two walks and six strikeouts over 5 2/3 innings before things got flat-out weird for the Pirates. With two outs and the bases full of Comets in the bottom of the sixth, OCC pitching coach Ron La Ruffa made his first visit to the mound to talk to Vidrio. As La Ruffa headed back to the dugout, he turned around to answer a last-second question by Vidrio -- a move that the umpires deemed as a "second visit to the mound" forcing head coach John Altobelli to remove Vidrio and pick a relief pitcher with ZERO warm-ups in the bullpen. 

That pitcher was Pabich, who used his warm-up tosses on the mound and calmly forced a harmless foul-ball fly out to third baseman Nick Grimes to end the biggest threat of the game by the Comets.

Pabich returned to the bullpen to properly warm up and proceeded to shut Palomar down the rest of the way, allowing three hits and one walk over the final 3 1/3 innings to collect his fourth save of the season.

Coast grabbed the lead for good in the bottom of the third inning when Robert Longtree led off with a walk, advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt by Jeff Nellis and scored on an RBI-double to right-center by Chaneng Varela, putting the Pirates ahead, 1-0.

Palomar lefty Jake Barnett (9-3) pitched well, but the Pirates struck again for two more runs in the bottom of the fifth. Varela led off with a single to right and advanced to second on a hit-by-pitch by Tommy Bell. Jack Kruger moved up both runners with a sacrifice bunt and Stephen Corona brought in Varela with a sacrifice fly to left, making it 2-0.

James McLellan followed with a two-out single to center that scored Bell to make it 3-0.

While the Pirate offense has been doing just enough, the Coast pitching staff has been flat-out dominant in the postseason. In 10 playoff games, Coast has notched a 1.86 team ERA, allowing just 18 earned runs over 88 innings.

After beating the NATION'S top two teams back-to-back, Coast will have to win one more game against No. 1-ranked San Joaquin Delta on Monday for the state championship, beginning at 11 a.m. If OCC loses, a second game will be played shortly thereafter.

Coast is looking to become the first team since the 2000-02 Riverside City College Tigers to win back-to-back state baseball championships.