Owls Walk It Off

After Barstow College took the lead in the top of the ninth, Citrus College dug deep and never gave up, grabbing a 7-6 walk-off victory.

The Owls improve to 5-5 on the year, while the Vikings fall to 1-8.

Barstow opened the game with four runs in the top of the first to take an early lead, but Citrus responded with two runs in the bottom half of the inning. With one runner on and two outs, Chad Green turned on a pitch for a no-doubt homer to cut the visitors' lead in half, 4-2.

The Owls pulled within one, 4-3, in the fourth after Roman Robles tripled off the fence in right field to lead off the inning and tagged up on a sacrifice fly from Matthew Espinoza.

In the bottom of the seventh, the Owls put two runners at third and second as Robert Moreno stepped up to the plate. The third baseman knocked a hard ball up the middle to send both runners home and put the Owls in front, 5-4.

The Vikings responded with two runs of their own in the top of the eighth to take back the lead, 6-5.

With the pressure on to score at least one to keep the game going, Green drew a free trip to first and Brandon Casini took over the baserunning. Nicholas Santiago moved him over to second with a sacrifice bunt, before a Viking error sent Casini home to tie the game.

The Owls put runners at third and second, but Barstow found a second out to put the Owls up against the wall. It looked like the Vikings would get a third out to send the game into extra innings with a routine ground ball to second, but the infielder mishandled the fielding and the throw, allowing Robles to score the game-winning run.

Ryan Luiz Harney through eight innings with five strikeouts before Anthony Verrone came in on relief to secure the win.

Citrus heads to Ventura College on Saturday for a 1 p.m. contest.