MC baseball has 18-inning tilt stopped for darkness
Chris Pedretti has experienced quite a bit in his 30-plus years of coaching.
The Merced College baseball coach has been through just about every scenario repeatedly during his Blue Devil-tenure. Still, Tuesday’s road trip to Sequoias provided the MC skipper a rare first.
After 4 1/2 hours of action the Blue Devils (16-9, 8-1 Central Valley Conference) and Giants (19-7, 7-2) couldn’t separate themselves. COS doesn’t have lights, and the game was finally called due to darkness after 17 innings with the game tied 7-7. The first-place battle will resume in the top of the 18th at Blue Devil Field on Friday afternoon.
The second game of the three-game series will take place immediately following the conclusion of the extra-inning affair.
“It’s definitely the longest game I think I’ve ever been a part of,” Pedretti said. “I don’t remember ever going 18 innings before. There were a number of times in extra innings where we had the go-ahead run on third with two outs and guys we wanted at the plate, but just couldn’t get a hit.
“Our outfield made some incredible plays, including Lawrence Anderson crashing into the fence, to keep the game going.”
Softball
Fresno City 2, Merced College 1 in Merced – Marta Mitchell blasted a solo home run in the first and Brianna Lopez struck out 10, but two fourth-inning unearned runs proved the difference as the She-Devils fell at home. The loss drops MC (15-11, 10-3 CVC) out of first place for the first time since conference play began.
This story was originally published March 29, 2017 at 3:56 PM with the headline "MC baseball has 18-inning tilt stopped for darkness."