Lucas Jacobsen threw a four-hit shutout on Thursday and James Hill drove in three runs, leading SBCC to a 14-0 blowout of Hancock in the final regular-season baseball game at Pershing Park.
The Vaqueros built a 10-0 lead after six innings and remained in a first-place tie with Oxnard atop the WSC North. Santa Barbara is 27-8 overall and 16-7 in conference with one game remaining on Friday at Hancock.
Jacobsen, a 6-5 left-hander who will play for Long Beach State next year, retired the last 14 batters in order and faced just three over the minimum. He struck out eight and walked none.
It was the third complete game and seventh shutout of the year by the Vaquero pitching staff, which is third in the State with a 2.34 ERA.
Jacobsen was coming off his worst outing of the year as he gave up five runs in one inning last Thursday in a 5-4 loss to L.A. Pierce.
“I feel like I had to prove myself this week,” said Jacobsen, who limited the Bulldogs (13-22, 8-15) to four singles. “I had to make sure my last start was a fluke. Last week, my head was all over the place. In my pregame today, I made sure to keep a steady head and just hit the glove.
“I’m very good at pitching with the lead and it was important for us to make sure they didn’t score early.”
The Vaqueros won for the third straight time to improve to 15-3 at home. They’ve scored 12 or more runs nine times this year. The 27 wins tied last year’s squad for the second-most in school history.
Spencer Erdman was 3-3 with a double, two runs and a stolen base while Hill went 2-4 with three RBIs. Hill leads the WSC North in batting (.378) and RBIs (33). Matt Henderson made some solid plays at shortstop and went 2-4 at the plate with two RBIs and three runs.
“I knew Lucas would have this type of outing, he’s a phenomenal pitcher and it was awesome to see him fill up the strike zone,” said Hill, who’s hitting .550 (11-20) in his last five games with four doubles and eight RBIs. “Our guys played great defense behind him. It was fun to watch.
“The mentality never changes with our offense. We’re just trying to get the next guy up. The best part about today was seeing everyone get those at-bats and seeing everyone be successful.”
Coach Jeff Walker used 18 position players and they collected 15 hits, including four doubles. The No. 9 hitters (Erdman, Austin Fietze and Nolan Soto) were a perfect 5-5.
The Vaqueros took a 4-0 lead in the third on an RBI single by Henderson, a throwing error that scored Cameron Jones and a two-out, two-RBI double down the left-field line by Hill. SBCC is 26-1 when scoring at least four runs.
“That was a great bounceback effort by Lucas, who got his first complete-game of the year,” said coach Jeff Walker. “He threw up a zero in the first, which has kind of escaped us a little this year. We got an early lead with some two-out hits and just kept piling it on.
“It was a good team win. We still have one more job to do (on Friday) to finish off Season 2.”
The Vaqueros are one win away from their fifth WSC title and third in five years.
“You can’t not think about that, we’ve been thinking about it since the fall and since last year, when we watched Oxnard dog-pile,” said Hill. “Getting that conference title is all we’ve been thinking about, it’s not something we’re going to shy away from.
“It’s something we’re going to take great pride in and we’re going to give our best effort on Friday.”
