SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Facing the prospect of a pitchers' duel with the owners of the nation's top two ERAs on the mound at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium, the UC Santa Barbara Baseball team (27-12, 13-6 Big West) decided they wanted to part of such thing and put on a yard party instead, mashing a season-high four home runs to overpower Cal State Fullerton (19-21, 11-8 Big West) and earn a series-opening 8-3 victory. Catcher Nate Vargas led the power surge with his first career two-homer game, hitting one to left and one to right for added style points. Xavier Esquer hit an opposite-field shot as well, and William Vasseur mashed a no-doubter for his first home run in Blue and Gold. And as for that suggestion of a pitchers' duel, Gaucho ace and national ERA leader Jackson Flora held up his end of the bargain, deploying his big, slow sweeper to great effect as he racked up eight K's across six innings of one-run ball to earn his eighth win of the season.
 
QUOTABLE
From Head Coach Andrew Checketts: "(Vargas) has been doing that the last couple of weeks since he got back in the lineup, he's been swinging the bat well, taking his A swings," Checketts said. "Early in the year he was kind of tentative and hesitant, lot of check swings and stops, and he's been going for it since he got back in the lineup. You know, he got pissed. He got pissed that he wasn't playing and wanted to play, and sometimes it takes that. It takes getting pissed off to go out there and play with some aggression, swing with aggression, and he's been going for it and he's been really swinging the bat well the last couple of weeks.
 
(Flora's sweeper) has always been good. They were heavy right-handed today, they had one left-hander in there; he didn't look like he had as good of a feel for the changeup today, so we were pretty heavy with that sweeper to get ahead. He did a good job of landing it, finishing guys off with it. He throws a little bit of a harder slider/cutter, which was good."
 
From Jackson Flora: "I've always been pretty good at supinating and spinning the ball, so it's pretty easy for me to manipulate the ball going to my glove side," Flora said. "With some work last year, it's gotten better this year, just being able to separate it into two different pitches and work it. When hitters see spin, if they see the big breaker first and they see spin again they might think it's the big breaker again and then all of the sudden it's the short one, or they have to be geared up for a hard fastball and a hard slider, that doesn't allow them to be comfortable guessing pitches or guessing speeds. So, somewhere between the heater and the sweeper, that's been pretty effective and it's probably my favorite pitch — the hard slider — to throw, so I like it."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED
Like they did at California Baptist on Monday, Santa Barbara scored early and often, tallying at least once in six of the first seven innings. The first two Gauchos to dig in against Fullerton starter Mikiah Negrete were both hit by pitches, and Vargas' sacrifice fly drove one of them home for a 1-0 lead. After Liam Barrett's double to lead off the second, Esquer drove him home with a big fly, an opposite-field shot that hit the tree beyond the right field fence. Nunez followed Esquer's lead with an opposite-field homer of his own to make it 4-0 in the third, the lefty driving his first of two out over the left field fence. The fourth inning was one of only two in which the Gauchos did not score, the other being the eighth.
 
The Santa Barbara bats heated right back up in the fifth, with Vasseur launching an absolute moonshot for his first home run with the team, 421 feet to left center, punching a hole in the canopy of one of the eucalyptus trees beyond the fence. Rowan Kelly was hit by a pitch, stole second and scored on Nick Husovsky's single in the sixth, and Vargas hit his second homer of the evening in the seventh, this time a towering fly ball that just cleared the right field fence. Vasseur had singled ahead of him and scored to bring Santa Barbara's run total up to eight.
 
And like they had on Monday, the Gaucho pitching staff was keeping the opposition lineup in check. Flora hit a batter and allowed a single in the first but fired back-to-back strikeouts to get out of the jam, then pulled the same trick after a pair of singles in the fourth. He was otherwise perfect in the second, allowed just a one-out baserunner in the third and fifth and was finally pipped for a single run in the top of the sixth, though that hardly threatened the Gauchos' lead, which was 5-1 at the time. Josh Jannicelli relieved him for the seventh and worked a perfect frame, then gave way to Raymond Olivas after walking the lead-off man in the eighth. That eighth was not perfect, as an error extended the inning an allowed two more (unearned) Titans runs to score. Eight-to-three was where the score stayed though, as Olivas was perfect in the ninth, ending the game on a strikeout looking.
 
UP NEXT
The Gauchos have the opportunity to clinch the series in game two Saturday, April 25, with first pitch set for 3:05 p.m. at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium. Tickets are on sale now at ucsbgauchos.com/tickets.