MJC baseball splits Friday 3C2A NorCal games in first home playoff series since 2006
Gritty.
That’s how Modesto Junior College baseball coach Alex Leach describes the team’s 3C2A NorCal Regional Playoffs first round Game 2 win over Sacramento City.
Freshman pitcher Gavin Farinha’s complete game, 150-plus pitch effort? Gritty.
Freshman Paul Contreras’ fifth inning two-run home run to extend the Pirates’ lead to four runs? Gritty.
But that’s what you need when you’re trying to make good on program history and extend your season.
Their efforts paid off in big ways as the Pirates took Game 2 of the best-of-3 series, 6-3, earning the chance to advance in a must-win Game 3.
The Pirates finished tied for third in the ultra-competitive Big 8 Conference standings, earning them a No. 12 seed. For the first time in nearly 20 years, the Pirates earned the chance to host a 3C2A NorCal playoff series. The last time they hosted was in 2006.
Thursday afternoon’s Game 1 was a 16-inning thriller, but the Pirates fell, 9-5. A win at 11 a.m. Friday was the only way to ensure at least one more game.
Farinha, a Turlock Christian graduate, earned the starting nod. He was coming off a 130-pitch effort last Friday against the same Sac City team in the Big 8 finale. He thought he was going to get an extra day of rest, but the playoff series was moved up one day. Instead of games on Friday and Saturday, they played Thursday-Friday because of expected rain on Saturday.
That did not matter to the left-handed pitcher. He was ready to go and Leach trusted him.
“It means a lot,” Farinha said of the trust his team had in him. “I mean, letting me go nine innings is pretty crazy. There were some innings where I struggled. They still had faith in me to get the job done. It feels pretty good.”
He fought through a hungry Panthers offense that scrapped eight hits, got out of tough situations with the bases loaded and overcame a blood blister on his left index finger that affected his slider to secure his sixth win this season. He struck out 10 batters.
“It’s an unbelievable performance,” Leach said. “Right up there with the best I’ve seen in the playoffs.”
Right fielder Logan Hart got the Pirates’ offense started with an RBI single, scoring second baseman Bryce Campbell in the top of the third inning. In the fourth, first baseman Titus Wheelock drove in Jacob Kowes with a single.
Contreras, a Gregori High alum, broke the game open in the top of the fifth inning, blasting a two-run home run to left field to make it a 4-0 game.
The center fielder leads the Pirates in nearly every hitting category in his freshman season. He has 58 hits (tied with Hart for a team high), 15 doubles, eight home runs, 43 RBI and scored 43 runs this season. He is second on the team in batting average, hitting .339.
“Big time players make big time plays. He’s extremely competitive, and he really cares about this,” Leach said of Contreras.
The Panthers answered with three runs in the bottom of the fifth before the Pirates added a couple of insurance runs. Campbell tripled in the eighth, driving in Dylan Fuller and Contreras scored again in the top of the ninth.
The Pirates put together an impressive 11 hits and held the Panthers scoreless in eight of the nine innings.
“Every single win in the playoffs is going to be gritty,” Leach said. “You can’t have a soft playoff win. It doesn’t exist. Whoever shows up, at the end of the day, is going to be the winner.”
The Pirates did not have the same luck in Game 3.
Sac City got out to a hot start in the second game of the doubleheader, scoring eight unanswered runs in the first four innings. The Pirates cut the deficit in half, scoring four in the bottom of the fifth inning, but the Panthers answered with five combined runs in the sixth and seventh. MJC could only find three more runs, which they scored in the bottom of the eighth, in the 13-7 loss.
Once again in the fifth Contreras homered, this one scored three runs. Catcher Carson Cripe had three hits and also drove in three runs in the game and right fielder Logan Heart added an RBI. Six Pirates accounted for nine hits and five players recorded a walk. Cooper Lanz, Lucas Leonard, Cameron Ward and Nate Criswell saw time on the mound for the Pirates.
The season ends with a 27-14 overall record and a 16-8 record in Big 8 play. They won 17 games at home.
As is the case with all sports at MJC, the baseball team is a team made of local talent. Just four of the 36 players on the 2024 roster are from out of California. The other 32 are Modesto-area products. Many of them played against each other in high school, but after four years of competing, it was not hard to then become teammates.
“Our coach put together such a nice squad and I grew up with most of these kids throughout high school and rec ball,” Farinha said. “We’re all super close, we’re like brothers. It’s been so sick.”
