Pierce hands Vaqueros an 8-2 home setback

Dominick Costello tossed five innings of no-hit ball on Saturday and L.A. Pierce scored five runs in the first three innings on the way to an 8-2 WSC baseball win over SBCC at Pershing Park.

Nicolas Bereaud broke up the no-hitter with a line-drive single to right in the sixth. Victor Sanchez-Ramirez relieved Costello with runners on first and second and no outs. Jake Gagain, who reached on an error, went to third on a groundout and scored SBCC's first run on a wild pitch, cutting the deficit to 6-1.

The Vaqueros loaded the bases on three walks with two outs in the fifth but Costello got Chris Smutny to fly out to right.

The Vaqueros fell to 7-10 overall and 4-4 in the WSC North. Eric Medellin went 2-4 with two doubles and two RBIs to pace the Brahmas (6-13, 3-7). Two days earlier, SBCC beat Pierce 5-2 in the opener of its four-game conference series.

Pierce outhit Santa Barbara 10-5 and took advantage of seven walks, three hit batters and four wild pitches by six Vaquero hurlers. Starter Ian Clark (2-4) was relieved three batters into the second inning after giving up two runs on four hits.

"We set the tone really early with a very uninspiring effort by our starter for the second time in a row," said coach Jeff Walker. "We didn't do a very good job of playing from behind. We're struggling with putting together two solid efforts in a row. We've been very inconsistent.

"We gave up a lot of walks, a lot of hits and a lot of free passes. That was the difference. The pitching and the catching side kind of got away from us. I thought we hit the ball hard on offense, we just had a lot of line-outs right at people."

The Vaqueros are hitting just .204 on the year while the opponents are batting .271. Connor Clark had two of SBCC's five hits on Saturday.

Evan Yeager had a two-run single in the second and the Brahmas added three more in the third on an RBI single by Medellin, a wild pitch that scored Brenden Lavallee and a delayed steal that plated Medellin just seconds before the Vaqueros made the final out of the inning.

Left fielder Deion Fernando stretched the margin to 6-0 in the fifth, driving in Lavallee with his second double of the game.

The Vaqueros will host Ventura on Tuesday in a 2:30 p.m. contest at Pershing Park.