Baseball: Griego tosses sixth complete game, Vikings sweep Pasadena with 7-0 win

Sophomore starting pitcher Julian Griego (Poly HS) tossed his second shutout of the season on his way to his sixth complete game to help lead the Long Beach City College baseball to a 7-0 South Coast Conference win over visiting Pasadena City College on Saturday at Joe Hicks Memorial Field.

Long Beach completed a three-game conference sweep of the Lancers to improve to 19-14 overall and 14-4 in SCC play. The Vikings continue to hold a two-game lead over Cerritos College (12-6) for first place in the conference standings with just three games left to play.  

Griego, now 7-2, was brilliant in today's outing, scattering five hits over nine innings. He struck out four and walked none while lowering his earned run average to 1.79 on the season.

Despite no extra-base hits, the Long Beach offense put the ball in play and made productive outs all day in the rout of Pasadena. Five of the Vikings' seven runs came on either ground outs or fielder's choices.

Freshman Jackson Foss (Wilson HS) had the lone big hit of the day, a bases-loaded single in the bottom of the first inning that scored sophomore Michael Thomas (St. John Bosco HS) and freshman Tanner Moore (Irvine HS) to start a three-run rally. Foss collected his third RBI of the game on a fielder's choice that brought home Moore in the fifth.

Sophomore Justin Davis (Mayfair HS) went 2 for 3 to lead the Vikings at the plate.

Brandon Murfett took the loss for Pasadena (8-25, 5-13 SCC) to fall to 0-3 overall. He allowed five runs and four hits over five innings.

Long Beach wraps up the regular season next week with a three-game SCC series against El Camino College-Compton Center. The series opens at the MLB Urban Youth Academy in Compton on Tuesday (Apr. 21) with Game 2 on Thursday (Apr. 23) at LBCC. The series finale returns to Compton on Friday (Apr 24) with all games played at 2:30 p.m.