San Marcos, CA (Baseball) -- Last call for the Citrus College Baseball team came earlier then they wanted this past weekend, when their 2009 season came to an end at the hands of #1 seed Palomar College. The Fighting Owls got a great day off the bump from sophomore Chris Freedman, but it wasn’t enough as Citrus suffered a 2-5 loss.
Freedman’s strong outing, started out rocky, as he surrendered three earned runs in the top half of the first inning. After that though, Freedman settled down retiring 21 of the next 25 batters between the second and third innings.
With Freedman giving Citrus a chance to win on the hill, the Fighting Owl offense stumbled all day long. Citrus’ first hit wouldn’t even come until the third inning, when Vincent Prado finally got on base thanks to an infield single to third base.
Two batters later Angel Marti would keep things going with another single this time through the left side, but that would be all the potential Citrus would see until the sixth.
In the sixth, Marti continued to do his part leading off the inning with a single up the right field line. The very next batter, Jacob Ludvik, bunted him over to second bringing up Julio Raymundo to the plate.
Raymundo made good with an RBI single through the right side of the field that scored Marti and cut the Palomar lead to two.
Unfortunately for Citrus Palomar would finally get back to a tiring Freedman in the ninth inning, scoring two more runs to take a commanding 5-1 lead into the bottom of the ninth. Needing a huge rally, Citrus mustered just one run in the ninth, bringing their season to a close.
Citrus finishes up their most successful season since 2003 with a 25-18 record and first regional playoff appearance in six years.
Box Score