Despite a heavy dose of adversity this season the UC Santa Barbara baseball team emerged as Big West Conference Champions.
The Gauchos came from behind to defeat UC Riverside 12-3 on Thursday evening and clinched the outright conference title, improving to 40-12 overall, 24-4 in Big West Conference play and 23-0 at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium.
“You could kind of feel the tension of ‘hey don’t screw this up’ in the dugout,” said UC Santa Barbara coach Andrew Checketts. “The playoffs feel like that. Being in a regional feels like that so it’s good for them to have that experience.”
Checketts’ father, Gordon Checketts, suddenly passed away after a medical emergency at the ballpark earlier this season. The emotions of the moment and of course thoughts of his father were strong as the postgame celebration ensued.
“Obviously on a personal note not having my father here is pretty emotional. It’s pretty remarkable to win the amount of games we won here after we lost him,” Checketts said. “My heart is pretty heavy. I’m excited, happy and really proud of the guys, but it would be hard not to be emotional about my biggest fan not being here.”
Another major obstacle this season was the Gauchos being forced to play their first 11 games of the season on the road due to issues with the playing surface at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium.
None of that mattered on Thursday as the players and coaches soaked in the glory of a champion well earned.
“It’s kind of ironic that after not having a field we get one and then we don’t lose on it,” Oakley said. “I feel like we were pressing a little bit, we know what each win at this point means for us. We were out of character to start the game.”
The Gauchos got on the board first in the bottom of the second inning by virtue of an Aaron Parker solo homer. However, the UC Santa Barbara bats went dormant for a significant stretch thereafter.
UC Riverside received an excellent performance in relief from Kurt Marton, who pitched 3.1 innings and the visiting Highlander capitalized offensively in the top of the fourth inning with three runs on three hits.
UC Santa Barbara’s starting pitcher Ryan Gallagher bounced back from the rough inning that was exacerbated by a fielding error and held the Highlanders scoreless for the remainder of his seven innings of work.
Meanwhile, the UC Santa Barbara offense sprung to life as the Gauchos manufactured two runs in the bottom of the fifth inning as Justin Trimble scored on a passed ball and Jonathan Mendez came home on a sac fly by Zander Darby.
The Gauchos followed that up with five runs in the bottom of the sixth inning, including three homer runs. Justin Trimble and Ivan Brethowr launched two run homers. And Jonah Sebring delivered a solo shot. When the smoke cleared the Gauchos led 8-3.
Overall the Gauchos mashed five home runs in the game, including a three-run homer by Oakley in the bottom of the eighth inning that closed the scoring.
UC Santa Barbara will host UC Riverside in the second game of their three-game series on Friday, beginning at 4:35 p.m.