USD Baseball 2004

WEST COAST CONFERENCE

wee BASEBALL The baseball portion of the WCC started with five charter membe rs and three associates as LMU, Pepperdine, Saint Mary's, San Francisco and Santa Clara were jo ined by UC Santa Barbara, Pacific and SanJose State.The conference ternpora1ily split from 1977-84 into the Northern and Southern California Baseball Associa– tio ns (so divisional play isn't cornpletly foreign to the league), but realigned in 1985 to include San Diego and Nevada in a seven-te'dlll league. In 1991, the Wo lf Pack departed and a six-team loop existed until Portland and Gonzaga, full members in all otl1er sports, left the Pac-10 North le agu e to bring th e WCC to its full-bo died e ight-team set in 19%. 171is is the seventh year of tl1e curTent eight-team WCC baseball alignment but the conference has detenninecl a champion in the sport annually since 1968. During tl1at time , teams in tl1e WCC have advanced to four College Wo rld Series, including a natio na l titl e in 1992 (Pepperdine} Four current members - San Diego, Loyola Marymount, Pepperdine and Santa Clara - have represented tl1e wee in NCAA to urname nt play. That foursome has a n all-time record of72-80 in the championships. P01tlancl is the only othe r current member with NCAA tourney experience, most recently in 1991 as the Pacific-IO North representative. West Coast Confe re nce baseball ente rs its 37th season and its fifth Se'dSOn ofdivisional play under an eight-team alignment. Two four-team divisions, aptly nan1ed "West" and "Coast" will play a 30-game schedule. The champi– ons ofeach division will collide at tl1e encl of the season in a best two-of-three series to determine the WCC's automatic e ntry into the NCAA Championships. The site of that playoff w ill be based completely on the out– come of tl1e regular season series meeting between the two champions. 171e winner of that tlvee-game regular season collision earns the right to host the champion– ships. Each team w ill play a total of six games agai nst each team in its own division, three home and three away, and a single three-game series against each team in tl1e opposite division. Every two years two tean1S w ill swap divisio ns, e ffective ly mix ing the matchups over a n e ight-year span. Of note is the fact that traditional local rivals (Portland-Gonzaga; Saint Mary's-San Francisco; LMU-Peppercline and Santa Clara-San Diego) will never be in tl1e same division.

USO celebrates its second straight West Coast Conference Championship. The To reros won the school's first-ever league title in 2002.

2 003 ALL-CON FEREN CE HON ORS

FIRST TEAM ALL-WCC Player (School) Jacob Barrack' ( Pepperdine) Joe Diefenderfer= (Santa Clara) Greg Ramirez•= ( Pepperd ine) _Ion Higashi'= ( LMU) Gordon Corder (Gonzaga) Da vid Uribes' ( Pepperd ine) Brya n Byrne' (Saint Ma,y·s) Kevin Estrada ( Pepperdine) Scoll Dierks= (Santa Clara) Josh Hansen' (San Diego) Joey Prast' (San Diego) Tony Perez (San Diego) Ry,in Sinauer (San Francisco)

Po. Yr_ Co-Players of the Year: p JR

Kevin Estrada (Pepperdine) Scott Dierks (Santa Clara)

p p

SR SR

Pitcher of the Year:

C

JR JR

Greg Ramirez ( Pepperdine) Freshman ofthe Year: Bryan Byrne (Saint l'vla,y 's)

1B 213 3B ss

FR FR SR

Coach ofthe Year

Frank Sanchez (Pepperd ine)

O F SR OF JR OF JR U T SR DH SR

=Unanimo us cho ice • Returns for 2004 season

O ther San Diego Players Honored: Second Team: no ne Hono rable Mentio n: Freddy Sandoval

32 • University of San Diego Toreros