Sophomore shortstop Jordan Gillerman's sacrifice fly in the bottom of the 12th inning with the bases loaded helped the Irvine Valley baseball team to a 4-3 victory over Cypress in an Orange Empire Conference game at IVC on Tuesday afternoon.
Irvine Valley won the first game of the three-game set between the two schools.
The Lasers (13-15, 4-9) and Chargers (19-9, 7-6) play again on Thursday at Cypress.
Irvine Valley got a strong start on the mound by sophomore right-hander Cole Millerd. He went nine innings and gave up three runs on 11 hits and one walk with five strikeouts.
Cypress took a 3-0 lead after four and a half innings, scoring runs in the top of the first, top of the third and top of the fifth innings.
Willie Aguilar came through with a sacrifice fly to score Aaron Case in the top of the first, Aguilar's ground out brought in another run in the third and Elijah Skipps had an RBI single through the right side to give Cypress the three-run cushion.
Irvine Valley answered with three runs in the bottom of the fifth inning to tie the score.
Sophomore catcher Branden Williams had an RBI single through the left side and freshman right fielder Weston Ellis smashed a hard liner that got through the infield and scored two runs to knot the score.
Both Millerd and Cypress starting pitcher Tyler Megill threw up zeros after that.
Megill ended up going eight innings and allowed three runs on six hits and two walks with four strikeouts.
Irvine Valley scored the game-winning run in the bottom of the 12th.
With one out, freshman first baseman Tyler Wagner singled to center and then Ellis hit a single to right center with Wagner moving to third. Sophomore left fielder Clint Jack was walked to load the bases.
Gillerman, with two strikes on him, was able to hit a fly ball to right field that was deep enough to score Wagner with the winning run from third base.
Sophomore reliever Andrew Jimenez earned the win, pitching three scoreless innings. He didn't give up a hit and struck out one. His record went to 1-0.
Andrew Quezada took the loss to drop to 5-2. He threw 3.2 innings and gave up one run on four hits and one walk with two strikeouts.
Skipps was 3 for 6 with one RBI, Bo Coolen was 3 for 5, Case went 2 for 6 with a double and two runs scored and Derek Reilly was 2 for 5 at the plate for Cypress, which had 14 hits as a team on the day.
IVC, which ended with 10 hits, saw Wager go 3 for 5 with a double and two runs scored, Ellis go 3 for 5 with two RBI and Williams go 2 for 4 with a walk, one run and one RBI.