Clay ArrittAlthough crowned solo champions of the Orange Empire Conference, the Santa Ana Dons were swept by the Golden West Rustlers in their final series of the regular season before the 3C2A playoffs begin.
The Dons suffered a whopping 15-2 loss in the final game of the series on Friday afternoon.
“You don’t want to back your way into [the playoffs],” head coach Tom Nilles said after the loss. “But we went out, we handled our business more times than not. We played really well in 33 games and bad in about four.”
Santa Ana was able to clinch the conference nonetheless because second-place Riverside lost against Fullerton, in a game that was played at the same time on Friday.
Santa Ana’s pitching struggled throughout the series against Golden West, who swung the bat well during all three games. The Rustlers’ bats were hot early once again on Friday, scoring multiple runs in the first four frames to get out to a 12-0 lead by the fourth inning.
“You have to give them credit,” pitching coach George Carralejo said. “They kicked our ass. I need to call a better game for us, I need to prepare us better, and our pitchers need to do a better job when we’ve got count leverage of throwing quality pitches to put guys away.” Santa Ana gave up 38 runs in three games to Golden West.
The pitching staff was missing its usual Game 1 starter in this series, sophomore Josh Rodriguez. Both Nilles and Carralejo stressed how much the staff missed Rodriguez.
“Anytime you lose one of your starters, it’s a loss because there’s a trickle down effect,” Carralejo said. “But we don’t make excuses. We’ve got good enough pitchers to fill the void. It didn’t work out for us. Hopefully Josh is back next week. He’s one of the best pitchers I’ve ever coached.”
One offensive highlight for the Dons was a solo home run from their shortstop, sophomore Jack Mueller. Mueller is one of the team’s leaders as one of the few returning starters. “I think we just need to take the same approach,” he said when asked how this team can bounce back after a tough series. “When all the guys are putting up good at bats, we’re a great team.”
Starting pitcher Zach Ireland took his first loss of the season, giving up seven runs (four earned) in just 2.1 innings. Ireland was asked about what went wrong: “Honestly, I wish I had the answer. I really felt fine out there, and felt like I was competitive with all four pitches. That’s a really good Golden West team.”
Ireland will likely be asked to take the ball in one of the Dons’ upcoming playoff games. “I’ve been in playoff situations before,” he said. “It’s all about turning the page and sticking with what works.”
Playoffs begin for the Dons this week after a great regular season, finishing 33-6-1 overall and 16-5 in conference play. It’s Santa Ana’s best conference finish since 2012.
“You start the postseason, everyone’s 0-0, and everyone’s good, right? There’s no gimmes,” Coach Nilles said. “There’s not going to be anyone to overlook, you have to play good baseball the whole way through. Hopefully we got it all out of our system this series.”
The expectation for Santa Ana during the playoffs? “State, nothing else. We’re the best team in the state,” Ireland said. “No one’s better than us when we’re playing at our best. We just struggled the last three games, maybe got a little bit ahead of ourselves. But there’s nothing else than a state championship that’ll be sufficient for us.”
The No. 2-seeded Dons will host a three-team, double-elimination tournament, welcoming Orange Coast and Cerro Coso. They will play the loser of game one on Friday at 3 p.m., with potential games on Saturday and Sunday also at Don Sneddon field.
