by Damien Alarcon
Staff Writer
After coming back from the UC San Diego Invitational at La Jolla last weekend, players of the University of La Verne baseball team could only be relieved that the end of a long, frustrating season has come.
Ending his final season before retirement with an overall record of 9-31, head coach Owen Wright could only look to the positive aspects of the team’s performance.
“We learned many valuable lessons about baseball and life,” he said. “You can’t win everything and there are times when things get really tough.”
The team finished the tournament winless in four games. There was a total of four teams in the two-day, round-robin tournament: UC San Diego, Chapman, Menlo and La Verne.
La Verne drew Chapman in the first round. Chapman dominated the game throughout the most part, having been up 12-0 going into the bottom of the seventh inning. However, the Leopards did not quit.
ULV scored 10 runs in the seventh and eighth innings. The game’s final score was 12-10 in favor of Chapman.
That was the closest ULV came to a win. The next game resulted in a 20-6 loss to UC San Diego.
Before the Leopards had time to breathe, two more losses came to end their season, both to Menlo, with scores of 11-2 in the first game and 7-0 in the next.
Next year, the team should be more experienced. It will lose only two of the 25 players, seniors Lyle Miller and Maynard McClarrinon.
“We should be a powerhouse in the next couple of years since nearly everyone is young and returning,” said sophomore Andrew Davis.
