COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – San Jose State baseball picked up a must-win victory as they held off a late rally by the Air Force Falcons to win 8-7 in the series opener played Thursday at Falcon Field.
The Spartans jumped out to a 6-0 lead after the first three innings, but saw the lead dwindle as the Falcons plated four runs in the sixth. SJSU then scored two in the top of the seventh as James Shimashita laced a RBI double and Santiago Cantu followed with a RBI single to give the Spartans a 8-4 lead.
Air Force (24-26, 10-14) was not through however as they answered with three runs of their own in the home half of the seventh to cut the lead to just one.
The Spartan pitching duo of Andrew Mitchel and Fineas Del Bonta-Smith was able to put an end to the threat as they finished things off to give the Spartans a much-needed win to improve to 20-32, 13-15. Mitchel (4-5) worked 7.2 innings scattering six hits and striking out eight. With his eight strikeouts, the senior increased his season punch-out total to 111, which is the 10th-most in school history.
Del Bonta-Smith took over for the final four outs and did his job to secure his ninth save of the season, which is tied for the second-most in a single season in school history and just one off the record.
After a leadoff single to start the bottom of the ninth, Del Bonta-Smith induced a 6-4-3 double play and then worked around a two-out single to end the game with a strikeout.
The Spartan bats tallied 15 hits on the day led by Nick Knecht who had a career-best three hits and two runs scored. Aaron Pleschner, Kellen Strahm, Shimashita and Cantu all finished with a pair of hits.
With the win, the Spartans postseason hopes are still alive, however they will need to keep the winning ways rolling into tomorrow's game, which begins at 12:00 p.m. PT.