The Bakersfield College baseball team fought back from an early two-run deficit and made their 2016 season debut a successful one, beating Feather River College 5-3 on Thursday night at Gerry Collis Field.
Freshman reliever Luke Andrews pitched four stellar innings of relief to earn the victory.
The 6-foot-2, 160-pound right-hander took over for BC starting pitcher Austin Toerner at the start of sixth inning and went the rest of the way, allowing no runs on one hit, one walk, and one hit batter.
He recorded three strikeouts.
Luis Martinez had the game-winning hit with a double into right field in the seventh that plated one run and gave BC its first lead of the game.
The score was tied 3-3 prior to Martinez's late-game heroics.
Jacob Herrera smacked a run-scoring single later in the seventh to provide the final margin of victory.
"I thought it was a well-played game on both sides," BC coach Tim Painton said. "Early we hit some balls hard with not a lot to show for it. We just stayed after it. I felt like we competed well for nine innings and were finally able to put something together. Luke Andrews was absolutely outstanding out of the bullpen tonight for us. It was a good team win."
After Toerner allowed the Golden Eagles to score two runs in the second inning the Renegades answered with a pair of scores in the bottom of the frame.
Feather River established a lead again in the third, scoring one run.
BC tied things in the sixth with singles by Luis Martinez, Harrison Smith, and Jassen Oliver followed by Kyle James' RBI fielder's choice ground-out.
Toerner had a rocky beginning to the game. The freshman from Golden Valley High School (Bakersfield, CA) gave up five hits and committed a throwing error that allowed a run to score during the first three innings.
But he settled down after that and retired the final eight batters he faced before being lifted.
"He was nervous as we thought he may be," Painton said. "His best two innings were his last two. We had him on a pitch count. We were going to get him out of there. He tried talk to himself into staying in the ballgame but that's not important tonight. I felt like he grew in the five innings he pitched."
The Renegades finished with 10 hits. Martinez and Smith had two hits each for BC, which tagged Feather River reliever Keoki Planas for three runs making him the losing pitcher.
James had two RBIs despite going 0 for 3.
The Golden Eagles had six hits. Their starting pitcher Brandon Vial pitched 5 1/3 innings in which he surrendered two earned runs on six hits and two walks.
Vial got out of a bases loaded one out jam in the third inning unscathed when Herrera drilled a screaming line drive that that was caught by Feather River first baseman Jeremy Peterson and turned into an inning ending double play.
BC left five runners on base over the first four innings.
"I felt like we had really good at bats early and didn't have whole lot of runs to show for it," Painton said. "But we were able to put together some stuff late and come out on the good side of things."