Box Score LA MIRADA, Calif. --- For weeks Biola baseball has been looking to this series with The Master's College Mustangs as an opportunity to prove their merit and rise to the upper half of the Golden State Athletic Conference standings. Not even a leadoff homerun from TMC's Colin Nyenhuis in the top of the first inning could deter Biola's will in this one, as the Eagles exploded for five runs on five hits in the bottom half and rode that lead to an 8-3 victory.
 
"To our credit, our guys made contact on good pitches," said Head Coach Jay Sullenger. "We were patient against a really good pitcher [Jason Karkenny] who was searching for his stuff in the first inning." 

Biola is averaging eight runs per game during its three-game winning streak. Today, it was Alec de Watteville who again led the charge offensively. Over the past two games, the shortstop has been collecting RBI like trading cards, drive in five runs in each game. He hit two homeruns on Friday to bring his season totals for home runs and RBI to eight and 29, respectively.
 
Sam Thorne was his reliable self in the two hole, joining de Watteville and Jeremy Barth as one of three Eagles with three hits on the afternoon. Jimmy Glllarda chipped in with two hits of his own and will take credit for one of the four extra-base hits for Biola on Friday. Gallarda hit his sixth double of the year in the third inning. All those extra-base hits came after Biola put five runs on the scoreboard in the first.
 
After surrendering the leadoff homerun to Nyenhuis, starter Eric Diomartich really settled down for Biola over the next six innings and pitched well enough to really earn his second win of the year.

"Dio did a great job of getting himself out of trouble today," said Sullenger. "He's continuing to show that he wants to be the man that leads the staff and is ' the guy' on Friday."

There's no better term to describe Diomartich's outing then quality start as he scattered three runs, all solo homeruns, over his six innings of work, while recording five strikeouts and inducing 10 swing-and-misses from Mustangs batters.
 
The Biola bullpen had no problem taking over in the final three innings. The three-part mix of Buddy Brouwer, Gabe Ihrig and Daniel Jang combined for three innings of clean work. The trio only allowed one runner to reach base on a walk and retired the last eight batters consecutively to end the game.
 
In the losing effort, Scott Savage salvaged a rough start for the Mustangs by coming in to relieve Karkenny in the bottom of the third. Savage only allowed a solo homerun to de Wateville in six innings of relief and saved the rest of the Mustangs bullpen for the doubleheader Saturday.
 
With the win, Biola improves to 13-16 on the year and 6-7 in GSAC play. The loss was The Master's College's 10th of the year and drops them to 7-6 in conference. These teams will resume action at Eagles Diamond Saturday in a doubleheader beginning at 11:00 a.m.