University of California, Santa Barbara

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Jackson Flora knows he likely pitched his final game at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium on Thursday night. The UC Santa Barbara Baseball team's ace is projected to be the first pitcher selected in this summer's Major League Baseball Draft, but before he goes, he gave the home crowd one last masterpiece to marvel at. Flora was perfect through the first seven innings and allowed just two hits en route to a complete game shutout of UC Riverside (15-35, 10-18 Big West) in the Gauchos' (35-16, 20-8 Big West) 1-0 series-opening win. His battery mate, Nate Vargas, provided all the offense needed with a mammoth home run in the third inning.
 
Thursday's clean sheet is Flora's second CGSO of the season and the third of his career, making him just the sixth UC Santa Barbara pitcher to record three or more across his Gaucho tenure and one of only eight to pick up two or more in the same season. The nine shutout innings bring his nation-leading ERA down to 1.03 in 2026, which would comfortably break Santa Barbara's Division-I single-season ERA record (1.71 by Steve Coleman in 1971) and gives him a chance to usurp the program's all-time record of 1.02, set by Craig Schell in 1967. His 12 strikeouts not only match his career high but also vault him into a tie for the fourth-most K's in a single campaign by a Gaucho, at 115 this year.
 
QUOTABLE
"Everything felt good, you know," Flora said. "Today was probably my last start in this stadium, so I was trying not to think too much and go out there and compete, pitch with some emotion and fight for my guys, and it was really fun."
 
"Everybody kind of knew what was going on late in the game, and it does creep into your mind a little bit, but being able to take it one out at a time and flush good pitches and bad pitches and just move on to the next pitch was really important for me today."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED
Flora set the Highlanders down with ruthless efficiency to start the game, with some help from his left fielder, Liam Barrett. The Gaucho ace got a groundout to second, a three-pitch strikeout, then a fly ball into the Santa Barbara bullpen in foul ground down the left field line, which Barrett hawked down and held onto despite going to ground. Flora took just eight pitches to get through the second, with two flyouts to right and a popout to shortstop, then cranked up the strikeout machine in the third. He started that inning with two punchouts, then ended it with a lineout to center field.
 
Vargas' home run in the bottom of the third gave Flora all of the run support he would need, and it — like Flora's dominance — was never in doubt, a ball that hit off the top of the 60-foot-tall video board in right field.
 
After a flyout and another strikeout, the second backwards K of the night, Barrett made another gold glove play in left to end the fourth inning, coming in and sliding to scoop a sinking line drive before it could hit the grass. Flora was on his way to an immaculate inning in the fifth, striking out the first two batters on three pitches each before a prolonged final at-bat ended with a flyout to first baseman Nick Husovsky in foul ground. There was no defense needed in the sixth, when Flora struck out the side, all swinging. The perfection continued in the seventh, with a groundout, swinging strikeout and flyout retiring the Highlanders in order.
 
Flora's big for the program's first perfect game ended with a leadoff ground-rule double into the right field corner in the eighth inning, and a one-out infield single put Highlanders on the corners. That play would have scored the tying run if not for the heroics of shortstop Corey Nunez, who made a diving stop to keep the ball on the infield. But traffic on the bases has never phased Flora; opposing hitters are batting just .147 against him with runners on this season, and a strikeout and a lineout kept the shutout intact. Flora racked up his 12^th strikeout of the night to start the ninth, won an eight-pitch at-bat with a groundout right in front of the plate for out number two, then watched Nunez show off his arm for the final out of the game. Despite a bobble, the Gauchos' shortstop was able to recover and unleash a cannon across the diamond in time to end the game.
 
UP NEXT
Santa Barbara returns to Caesar Uyesaka Stadium for the second game of this weekend's three-game series against UC Riverside on Friday, May 15 at 4:35 p.m. A win will keep the Gauchos on track to finish as the no. 1 seed for The Big West Championship, which begins next week in Irvine.