After Santa Barbara City College Baseball’s streak of three straight Western State Conference North titles was snapped in the regular season, the Vaqueros have been a team on a mission in the postseason.
SBCC pulled off impressive wins in the SoCal Regional and Super Regional rounds to advance to the Southern California Finals for just the third time in program history and the first time since the 2015 season.
The Vaqueros, a No. 13 seed this postseason, will head down to San Diego to take on No. 1-seeded Palomar College for the SoCal Finals, a three-game series with the first on Friday at 2 p.m.
Road to SoCal Finals
SBCC ended the regular season at 23-15 to earn a spot in the SoCal Regionals against San Diego Mesa and Riverside.
The Vaqueros won three of their four games at the SoCal Regional, including a 15-6 victory over San Diego Mesa to punch their ticket to the SoCal Super Regional.
The Super Regional round came against a familiar foe, as SBCC clashed with Allan Hancock College in Santa Maria for a three-game series. Allan Hancock was the team that dethroned SBCC for the WSC North championship.
The Vaqueros got their revenge from the regular season, pulling off a 10-9 comeback win in extra innings to open the series and following it up with an 8-3 win to clinch a spot in the SoCal Finals.
Meanwhile, Palomar College cruised to its fifth straight Pacific Coast Athletic Conference championship in the regular season after going 23-2 in conference play. As a result, the Comets were awarded the No. 1 seed in California for the postseason.
Palomar has won all five of its playoff games heading into the SoCal Finals, defeating Mt. San Jacinto and Mt. San Antonio in the first round before sweeping Saddleback in the SoCal Super Regionals.
Impact Players to Watch
The Vaqueros field standout student-athletes across the diamond, from an electric shortstop to a two-way star.
Sophomore shortstop and leadoff hitter William Matuszak has been in the middle of the action all season for SBCC, leading the team in batting average (.377), on-base percentage (.523) and slugging percentage (.659).
Matuszak also shares the team lead in homers with 10, is second on the team in RBIs with 42 and has a program record 38 stolen bases this season. He was named the WSC North Player of the Year.
Meanwhile, freshman Wylan Nelson has made an immediate impact at the plate and on the mound en route to WSC North Pitcher of the Year and Freshman of the Year Honors.
Nelson, a Ventura High graduate, boasts an impressive .349 batting average and .484 on-base percentage. He has tallied 60 hits, six homers, 42 RBI and 44 runs scored. He has also thrown 94 ⅓ innings to a 2.86 ERA, racking up 85 strikeouts on his way to a 9-0 record.
As for Palomar, two-way freshman Elijah Stephens has been a player to watch all season long. Stephens dominated in all aspects of the game on his way to PCAC Player of the Year and Freshman of the Year honors.
He hit a whopping .510 in conference play with nine homers and 47 RBI, while also recording a 1.76 ERA across 15 ⅓ innings on the mound.
Ryan Herrod is the ace of the Comet staff, however, as he went 7-1 with a 3.80 ERA across 45 innings of conference play and was named the PCAC Pitcher of the Year.