Central Arizona jumped to a quick, 5-1 lead after the top of the third and expanded it from there to win its opening game at the NJCAA Division I Baseball World Series over Cowley County Sunday, 12-4. The game was halted after seven innings by the run rule.
The win moves the sixth-seeded Vaqueros into a match-up with the winner of Monday's Shelton State, the No. 9 seeded, and third seeded San Jacinto-North, on Tuesday at approximately 6:30 p.m. Arizona time.
The crowning blow in the third for CAC was Seth Beckstead's two-run triple. Although fifth-seeded Cowley scored two in the bottom of the inning it was never able to catch Central.
Dayton Dooney led the CAC offense with three hits, including two doubles. Kiko Romero and Dusty Garcia both homered with Romero's being a grand slam in the seventh. That provided the eight-run margin which ended the game when Cowley failed to score in the bottom half of the inning.
Preston Godfrey and Tyler Griggs also added two hits each for the Vaqueros.
In Division II, ninth-seeded Phoenix fell to the No. 1 team, LSU-Euince, 9-1 in seven innings, dropping the Bears into the loser's bracket. PC will face fifth-seeded Madison Tuedsday at about 11 a.m. Arizona time.
Against LSU-Eunice, PC trailed just 2-1 until the Bengals scored five in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Gino Caperon had two of Phoenix' three hits.
