A month ago, the Long Beach State baseball team had questions surrounding its youth, anemic offense and ability to prevail in tight game situations.
Oh how the times have changed.
Since falling to Pepperdine, 12-2, on March 20, the Dirtbags have won 12 of their last 18 games, including taking nine of 12 against Big West Conference opponents to put their overall record at 18-19 as of Sunday.
LBSU went into conference play with a 9-16 mark, but their 9-3 record in Big West play, the Dirtbags are tied with Cal State Fullerton for first place in the Big West standings.
Of course this stretch puts them in a great spot to compete for the conference title, but head Troy Buckley has continuously said that it is much too early for any of that sort of talk.
“We still have a lot of baseball to play,” Buckley said. “We’ve played four series in [Big West] action and we have another four to go.”
This is exactly what LBSU fans would want to hear from the head coach of such a young team. They are not looking ahead and thinking that they can just show up and win the Big West.
Rather, they are taking a more simple approach: One game at a time.
A big reason as to why the Dirtbags have “turned around” their season is due to their play in close games. Before March 20, Long Beach was 3-8 in one-run games and since they have been 7-3, including the series-clinching 5-4 win Sunday over the Anteaters.
That’s not to say they were a bad club before March 20, they just hadn’t been able to in close games till this recent stretch.
The improved play in one-run games can be credited to timely hitting and the rise of sophomore Kyle Friedrichs as the team’s closer.
Friedrichs is reminiscent of Eddie Magallon’s rise in 2011 to the same position and has provided the Dirtbags with that arm to lean on when heading into the last few innings with the lead.
Friedrichs has anchored the Dirtbags bullpen with six saves while striking out 25 in 24 1/3 innings in 18 appearances.
Mentioning the success of Friedrichs also calls for some recognition of the starting trio of Matt Anderson, Ryan Strufing and Shawn Stuart.
The three weekend warriors have yet to allow their respective ERA’s to climb over the 3.00 mark, something no other Big West pitching rotation can boast.
Also on the rise is junior shortstop Matt Duffy’s relevance to the LBSU offense. Over the summer, Duffy starred in the famed Cape Cod League and earned a starting spot in the midsummer All-Star game for the Orleans Firebirds, but floundered early in the year under the microscope of big expectations.
Duffy began the season on an elongated slump and was eventually dropped to seventh in the batting order by Buckley. However, he is now hitting .267 with 16 RBIs, including the game-winning hit Saturday in the Dirtbags thrilling 4-3 walk-off win over UCI.
With four more Big West series to play, Duffy will have to continue his clutch hitting for the Dirtbags to sustain any success as long as their stellar pitching holds true.
The Dirtbags have a chance to take a stronger stance in the Big West standings with a trip up to the 405-freeway to face off against the 16-20 Cal State Northridge Matadors.
The Matadors might not be a team that strikes fear in the heart of their opponents with an unfavorable 4-5 record against Big West opponents, but LBSU can ill-afford to take anybody lightly.
From there the Dirtbags play Loyola Marymount in an out of conference series before returning to Big West action when they visit UC Davis in their last road trip of the regular season, and then closing out against Pepperdine and Fullerton.
Besides Fullerton’s seemingly always nationally ranked squad, the Dirtbags’ schedule seems like a cakewalk compared to the early season schedule they already endured.
Buckley and Co. should be feeling pretty good about what they have accomplished thus far, but as the head coach said, there is plenty of time between now an the end of the season.
interesting