Coyotes blanked

Steve Guiremand

Thursday, May 9, 2002 | 9:39 a.m.

ST. GEORGE, Utah -- Community College of Southern Nevada's first appearance in the Scenic West Athletic Conference postseason baseball tournament also produced another milestone that head coach Tim Chambers would just as soon forget.

"It's the first time all year that we've been shutout," Chambers said after the Coyotes were blanked by Ricks College, 2-0, on Wednesday afternoon at Bruce Hurst Stadium. "We picked a good time for it, huh?"

Not exactly.

The Coyotes (41-16), who have lost their last five games, now find themselves in the losers' bracket of the double elimination tournament. And that means they'll have to win six straight games over the next three days starting with a game against North Idaho this morning if they are to claim the SWAC Tourney title.

"It will be extremely difficult," Chambers said of the path to the title. "Not only do you have to win a lot more games, but we'll have to do it without one of our top pitchers."

Chambers found out at Tuesday night's all-conference meeting that star reliever Josh Kerschen, ejected from a game against Southern Idaho last weekend after hitting Golden Eagle outfielder Nick Connor in the leg with a pitch, must sit out six games because the play was termed "a violent ejection" by the umpire.

The University of Texas-bound Kerschen is 7-1 with three saves and a sparkling 3.51 ERA in 17 appearances. He won't be eligible to return to the Coyotes until Saturday afternoon's championship game -- if they get that far.

"It's a garbage rule," Chambers said.

"We didn't even know he was out until we got here. He hit the guy in the leg. There had been no warning or anything. (The umpire) just tossed him. That's not baseball. He gets a six-game suspension for hitting a guy in the leg? Come on. It's not like he ran up and punched him in the mouth or something."

If Kerschen had been a position player, he would have had to sit only three games. But SWAC rules specify that a pitcher must miss six games.

"It just kills you," Chambers said. "It breaks your heart and is such a big distraction going into the tournament. I think those types of things cause you to have a lack of focus. Today we had a lack of focus and just didn't play well."

Indeed, the Coyotes' biggest problem Tuesday wasn't pitching but hitting. CCSN managed just two scratch singles off Ricks lefty Troy Cate, who struck out six and walked just one.

"He's a good pitcher," Chambers said. "We knew coming in that he was a good pitcher. He beat us earlier in the year. He threw a lot of strikes and never really gave us a lot of opportunities."

CCSN's offensive ineptness wasted an outstanding performance by left-hander Jake Vose, who tied a career-high by striking out 12 batters. He allowed just six hits and walked two.

"He definitely pitched good enough to win," Chambers said. "They got the big hits when they needed it."

The game was scoreless until the top of the fifth when Ricks DH Greg Carr led off with a walk, was sacrificed to second and scored on a bloop single down the right field line by third baseman Rob Lindstrom.

The Vikings (20-21) added an insurance run the following inning. Shortstop Jeff Reber drilled a one-out double off the bottom of the fence in left-center and came around to score on an RBI single by Carr.

Meanwhile, CCSN could manage only a first-inning ground single by first baseman John Caruso and a second inning single by shortstop Zeke Parraz.