The Santa Barbara Foresters opened their final week of the regular season with a 5-4 rivalry win over the San Luis Obispo Blues on Tuesday at Sinsheimer Stadium in San Luis Obispo.
The Foresters (23-5-1) will remain on the road against the Orange County Riptide on Thursday before returning home for a three-game weekend set, including two games against the Blues on Saturday and Sunday.
Following Sunday’s regular-season finale, Santa Barbara will head to Wichita, Kansas for the NBC World Series.
Santa Barbara came out of the gates on fire, plating two runs in the top of the first thanks to an RBI single by Cole Chamberlain (Oregon) and a San Luis Obispo error to go up 2-0.
That lead held until the bottom of the third inning, when the Blues offense erupted for four runs highlighted by a bases-clearing double from Brendan Comerford to take a 4-2 advantage.
After a scoreless fourth inning from both squads, the Forester bats swung back with a big top of the fifth with some help from the SLO defense.
A walk and a pair of Blues’ errors put Chris Newstrom (UCSB) and Kurt Ippolito (Central Christian) at second and third with one out. Chamberlain then drove in his second run of the day with a sacrifice fly to cut the deficit to 4-3.
One batter later, Addison Klepsch (UC San Diego) belted a two-run home run to vault the Foresters into a 5-4 lead
The Forester bullpen took over and dominated from there, beginning with a 1-2-3 sixth inning that featured a pair of strikeouts by Caleb Hoover (Nebraska).
Nick Salmon (Oregon State) then took over in the seventh and got in some trouble, walking the bases loaded with two outs. Santa Barbara manager Bill Pinard then turned to Luke Cornelison (Arkansas), who came through with a strikeout to strand the three runners and maintain the lead.
Cornelison dominated his way through the San Luis Obispo lineup for the rest of the night, striking out four and allowing just one hit to lead the Foresters to the rivalry win.
Newstrom went 2-for-3 with two runs scored at the top of the lineup for Santa Barbara, while Ippolito came around to score twice as well.
Jack Fowler (Pepperdine) started the game for the ‘Sters, allowing four runs on five hits while striking out two in five innings of work.
