Riverside City College Tiger Casey Murray Jr. get caught up in a pickel and picked off at second during the game with the Cypress College Chargers. (Photos By Stephen Day | Viewpoints) 
RCC Tiger infielder leaps to catch the throw to second base, allowing the runner to slide safely under him to second during the game with the Cypress College Chargers. 
RCC Tiger Matt Hudson fires the ball down for a strike during the game with the Cypress College Chargers.
By Seth Haygood
A back-and-forth slugfest peaked with a seven-run fifth inning that propelled the Riverside City College baseball team to victory over Cypress College.
That rally on April 1 ignited a spark in every player on the Tigers, including freshman catcher Anthony Gibbons.
“(That inning) was really good,” Gibbons said. “It made us feel comfortable. Made us ease up a little bit on the defensive and the offensive side, so it was cool.”
From that point on, the momentum was too much for the Chargers and RCC ended up securing the win 17-11.
One of the Tigers’ key players was sophomore first baseman Adrian Arechiga. He started the fifth inning by scoring two of his six RBIs on the day.
“Each at-bat I just tried to not be tense and focus on staying in the middle of the field, getting my barrel to the ball and driving through it,” Arechiga said.
There were plenty of control issues with Cypress’ pitches not finding their target, causing some passed balls. The Tigers took advantage of those mistakes with extra stolen bases.
“(We) really just tried to hone in and stay diligent with the approach,” Riverside head coach Rudy Arguelles said. “(We were) trying to be patient and force them to come in the zone. I felt the guys offensively overall did a really good job.”
RCC had an extra edge to it’s play after Cypress snapped the Tigers 16-game win streak on March 31 that dated all the way back to Feb. 14. With the win, the team took the season series against the Chargers.
Early fielding struggles hurt the Tigers in the first couple innings.
“To be honest, I don’t know if we even really cleaned (the defense) up. We just happened to be on the fortunate side of a W and not an L,” Arguelles said. “Sometimes it’s like that. I don’t think that’s the brand of baseball that we want to play but in this conference having the opportunity to get the W and get a conference series win, we’ll take it.”
Riverside will be on the road for a non-conference game against the LA Mission College Eagles on April 4. The team knows it has to follow the gameplan to win and get back on track.
“Just come out and simply compete,” Arechiga said. “Take care of the little things and if we can do that, then we’ll be successful.”
