‘Good Knight, now’ – Griffins blitz City

By Nick Pellegrino
Updated: March 19, 2025

2025 GROSSMONT COLLEGE BASEBALL

East County Sports.com

FLETCHER HILLS – The closed-meeting pre-game speech from Grossmont College head coach Randy Abshire seemed fairly obvious to those in the clubhouse.

Abshire probably reminded his troops that San Diego City, despite its poor record, was good enough to lead first-place Palomar entering the eighth inning in Monday’s game, so there were good enough to beat you.

The Griffins heeded the warning.

Capped by a 3-run home run by M.J. Sweeney, Grossmont pounced quickly with five runs in both the first and second innings to mount a huge lead, downing the Knights, 14-4, Tuesday (Mar. 18) at Noel Michelson Field.

The victory kept the Griffins just 1.5 games behind Palomar in the Pacific Coast Athletic Conference standings, but the more important result came onthe other end.

San Diego Mesa, which entered the week tied with Grossmont for second place, again fell on the road after Southwestern took a 6-5 decision in 10 innings/ This, the Olympians fell injto fourth place, while the Jaguars remained a half-game behind the G-House.

San Diego City, which lead Palomar by three runs before the Comets scored 8 times in the 8th inning on Monday, saw its pitching staff hit a wall.

With Grossmont scoring 10 early runs, the arms of the nights have allowed an unleasent 18 runs over just three innings.

After Griffins startng pitcher Johnny Nunez set SDCC down in oder to start the contest, he was rewarded with a 5-0 lead.

Nunez coasted from there, stricking out five Knights batters in his six innings to collect the victory.

On offense, shortstop Logan Aguilar matched Sweeney with three RBI, while outfileder Jacob Embleton droe home a pair.

All three were set-up by a stellar effort of the top of the batting order.

Lead-off batter Noah Libed, the first baseman, reched base four times and swcored each time. Kibed was followed by third baseman Nico Newhan, who collected three hits and scored twice.

Collectively, the first four Grossmont batters went a composite 7-for-154 and scored 11 runs.

The Griffins-Knights series concludes Thursday at Morley Field in Balboa Park, starting at 2 p.m.

On Friday, Grossmont will host Citrus in a non-conference, rainmake-u contest, with a special 1 p.m. early start time.