Feb. 4, 2017
REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - The 2017 San José State baseball squad combined on a one-hit shut out against the Alumni team under gray and occasionally drizzly day at Colt Field on the campus of Cañada College on Saturday.
Junior right-hander Josh Nashed took the mound for the 2017 Spartans and faced an alumni team batting order of Ricky Acosta (2012-13 letterwinner), Michael Reiling (2009-12), Nick Schulz (2011-13), Tim Quiery (2010-13), Kyle Gallegos (2012, 14), Tommy Gale (2008-09), Andrew Rodriguez (2011), Matt Lopez (2012-14) and Andre Mercurio (2012-15).
The Spartans' number one starter was dominant allowing only one base runner, a walk, over 5.1 innings while striking out nine alumni batters.
"Josh was really good. That's what we expect. Obviously, our best players will overpower the alumni players because they are not in game shape but it wasn't just that. He was down in the zone, he was hitting the spots and that's what we wanted to see," said Spartans head coach Jason Hawkins.
"I just kept pounding the strike zone," said Nashed, who threw a total of 63 pitches, 44 of them for strikes before being pulled out when he reached his pitch count.
Junior Hilario Tovar came in relief and allowed the only hit by the Alumni team in the sixth inning while striking out three in 1.2 innings.
Newcomer Jaiden France pitched a 1-2-3 eighth before Joseph Balfour closed out the game in the ninth.
While Hawkins was pleased with the pitching of his starter and top bullpen pitchers, he felt an improvement was needed with the offensive approach despite scoring nine runs and 11 hits.
"If we are going to be an offensive team, we have to hit before we get to two strikes and we didn't do that today. My message to the team will be, when we get into the season it'll be harder to battle when we get to two strikes," said Hawkins.
Joseph Stefanki collected three hits, while Shane Timmons and Kellen Strahm got two hits each for the 2017 Spartans.
The Spartans open their season at UCLA on Friday, February 17.
Notes:
The 2017 Spartans put out a lineup of Kyle Morrison (2B), Shane Timmons (1B), Chris Williams (RF), Josh Nashed (DH/P), Joseph Stefanki (C), Kellen Strahm (CF), David Campbell (3B), Aaron Pleschner (SS) and Corey Olivet (LF).
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