LEWISTON, Idaho -- With last week's run to a regional title fresh in their memory banks, the Fresno State Sunbirds return to action Monday in the NAIA World Series.
The Sunbirds face Lee of Tennessee at 8:30 a.m. at Harris Field.
Fresno Pacific reached the tournament's final eight thanks to a pinch-hit, two-out, two-run walkoff home run by
Dwight Nixon to win an elimination game that resulted in an 8-6 victory against Embry-Riddle on Saturday.
The Sunbirds weren't listening to anyone who suggested their stay at the NAIA World Series would be a short one, even when they fell behind 6-1 Saturday, the Sunbirds still believed they could win.
They remembered winning last week's regional title by winning five straight elimination games.
' "No one ever said we were done," Nixon said of his team's mood during Saturday's game. "We knew we were going to start hitting again."
After being shut out in Friday's 5-0 loss to host school Lewis-Clark State, the Sunbirds failed to score in their first four at-bats on Saturday.
They managed their first run in the fifth, then broke out with four in the sixth thanks to a three-run triple off the centerfield wall by
Joey Norwood. Another run in the seventh tied the game.
Meanwhile, relief pitcher
Brian Oliver was shutting down Embry-Riddle for the final 3 2/3 innings.
Nixon, who injured his left thumb late in the regular season, was kept out of Saturday's game by coach
Oscar Hirschkorn because he re-hurt the thumb on Friday.
But Hirschkorn called on Nixon with the score tied 6-6 in the bottom of the ninth after
Anthony Lowell's two-out single kept the inning alive. Nixon responded with a blast over the wall in left field and was mobbed by his teammates at home plate.
"(Hirschkorn) told me if he needed me he might call on me," Nixon said. "He gave me that call. You can't get any better scenario than that."
Nixon said he hoped Saturday's victory would spark another run like last week, when the Sunbirds won five straight elimination games to take the regional title.
"This gives us great momentum, like at regional," he said. "We're ready to go."