St. Mary’s baseball opens first-ever NCAA tourney Friday
In a rocky season for Division I college baseball in the Bay Area, only St. Mary’s made the NCAA regionals, and the Gaels did it for the first time in their history.
Besides the Utes, the conference placed only Washington (32-21, 17-13), Arizona (37-20, 16-14) and Arizona State (34-21, 16-14) in the field.
The Gaels, under third-year head coach Eric Valenzuela, won their first West Coast Conference tournament championship by beating Gonzaga 13-4 Saturday.
A season-ending three-game sweep of Oregon allowed Stanford (31-23, 15-15 Pac-12) to finish tied for sixth in the league in Mark Marquess’ 40th year as head coach of his alma mater.
Despite missing almost two full seasons to the elbow injury, he is expected to be a first-round pick in the draft, which begins June 9.
Led by catcher Brett Cumberland, who hit .344 and led the Pac-12 with 16 homers and 51 RBIs, Cal (32-21, 14-16) was second in the conference batting (.293) and first in home runs (47), but the Bears finished in a tie for eighth.
The Bears secured head coach David Esquer’s 500th career win by beating Washington State 11-5 on the final day of the regular season.