Santa Ana College's Don Sneddon Gets 1,000th Win

COSTA MESA, CA - Santa Ana College (SAC) baseball coach Don Sneddon, already the all-time leader in wins, recorded his 1,000th career victory following the Dons 4-3 win at Orange Coast College.

The win, which improves the Dons to 12-5 and 5-0 in the Orange Empire Conference, came behind SAC's first complete game turned in by Ruben Orosco.

"Ruben did a great job out there on the mound," Sneddon said. "He kept us in it and didn't get wrapped up in all of the hoopla...you don't see [a complete game] very often in community college baseball...I'm sure there were some emotions in there."

Orosco held the Pirates (16-4, 2-3) to three runs on 11 hits while striking out five batters. His offense gave him two early runs in the first two innings as the Dons never trailed in the game.

Danny Recio scored the game's first run when Marcus Meraz reached on an error with two outs. Adrian Garcia extended the Dons lead to 2-0 in the second inning when he singled, advanced on an error and scored on Trevor Magno's sacrifice fly.

After Coast cut the Dons lead to 2-1 in the third inning, Gary Apelian put the Dons up 3-1 with a solo home run to lead off the sixth inning. The Pirates answered with a run of their own in the sixth to cut the lead to 3-2.

Magno gave the Dons the insurance run they needed in the seventh inning when he reached on an infield single, moved to third on an Andy Peterson single and scored on a wild pitch.

The Pirates pushed their final run across in the bottom of the ninth with two outs. But, with a runner on first base, Orosco got a fly ball to right field to give the Dons the win.

"It wasn't about the 1,000th win," Sneddon said. "A lot of people are obviously here for that. But it was [about] beating Orange Coast on their home field. They're the number one ranked team in the state and we're in a dogfight for this league championship."

NEXT: Santa Ana vs Cypress, Tuesday, March 15 at 2:00 pm