Santa Barbara City College pitcher strikes out 21. From SB Newspress.
Like a living version of the Bruce Springsteen song "Glory Days", SBCC pitcher Zach Edgington repeatedly threw the speed ball (and a curve and changeup) by batters and made them look like fools.
And after he was finished, Edgington also ended up in the school record books.
The SBCC pitcher struck out an eye-popping 21 in a complete game six-hitter in leading the Vaqueros to an important 4-2 Western State Conference win over Ventura on Thursday at Pershing Park.
While Tommy White had a key two-run single early, and Steven Keller had two RBI, including a solo home run that tied the SBCC team record for homers in a season, Edgington put forth an effort that included four strikeouts in one inning.
"Everything was working, "Edgington said. "I knew I had good stuff, so I knew if I hit my spots I was going to get them out. The curveball was there the whole time ... the changeup wasn't there at the start, but I found it. I had good (velocity) and good command with the fastball."
The left-hander finished three short of the national community college record set in 1969 by Steve Nichols of Monroe College in Rochester, N.Y., and tied a year later by Henry Hyude of Mayfair College in Chicago.
More importantly, Edgington kept alive the third-place Vaqueros' hopes for a berth in the Southern California Regionals.
From the start, Edgington was on fire, striking out the side in the first inning and seven of the first nine outs by mixing his 90 mph fastball with a curve that often had batters frozen. Three of those seven strikeouts caught batters looking.
"What I said at the beginning of the season is that he is a bona fide ace," coach Teddy Warrecker said. "All (the remaining games) are all kind of must win at this point and it was good for us to win a tight ballgame, with just an incredible sophomore leadership performance by Zach."
The Vaqueros took advantage of Ventura starter Anthony Martinez's wildness (two walks and two wild pitches) and a throwing error to score three times in the third on White's two-run single and an RBI groundout by Keller.
Edgington cruised through the middle innings, striking out at least two batters in each frame and giving up one run without getting into any serious danger.
In the seventh Edgington dismissed Alex Solis and Allen Gwynn on strikeouts, and looked to be out of the inning when his third strike to Ricky Lipman bounced in the dirt.
Lipman moved to second on a throwing error and scored on Thomas Quackenbush's single.
Joseph Luna followed by reaching on an error that put runners at second and third, but Edgington bore down, and struck Adam Barry out for the fourth time to end the threat.
Edgington struck out only Dewey Grattan in the eighth (the only inning where he struck out fewer than two batters) and the Vaqueros got an insurance run on Keller's home run to left center, the team's 49th of the season.
Edgington struck out both Solis and Ralph Robles-Rivas looking in the ninth, but walked Lipman to bring up Quackenbush - the only Cougars batter who had not been the victim of a strikeout in the game.
After getting ahead early with a 1-2 count, Edginton reared back and fired his final pitch. Quackenbush flinched then froze as he was called out for the last out of the game.
"I just got a little tired at the end and left the ball up (on the walk)," Edgington said. "But Teddy came out and calmed me down and I got the next guy and was pumped up. Complete games don't happen all the time so I was trying to stay calm to get the last out but it was hard."
Edgington threw 160 pitches despite dealing with a nagging groin injury he suffered earlier this week.
Before the game, Warrecker made his pitcher promise to let him know if something was amiss.
"I just wanted him to be honest with us if he was not feeling good," Warrecker said. "The training staff did a great job in getting him prepared, it was a cool day. I felt he still had a great fastball in the end without showing any external signs of fatigue.
"Maybe he had to do that today for us to win 4-2."
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