PHOTOS: Costa Mesa takes over Empire League lead with home victory over Fullerton

Costa Mesa players and coaches celebrate after Friday’s victory. (PHOTOS: Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone).

Costa Mesa’s baseball team jumped ahead early against Fullerton, then relied on power hitting and outstanding pitching to notch a key 6-1 Empire League victory over the Indians Friday afternoon at Costa Mesa.

Costa Mesa (17-6, 7-3) moved into first place in league play over second place Fullerton (14-8, 6-3). Fullerton won the first two league games over Costa Mesa 5-0 on March 10 and 5-2 on Tuesday.

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“We’ve played one more game than they have,” said Costa Mesa Coach Jim Kiefer, who has led the Mustangs to two consecutive league titles.

Costa Mesa was led by starting pitcher Will Morales, who allowed two hits and one earned run while striking out four in five innings to improve his record to 7-1. Wylan Rottschafer, who started the game at shortstop, earned the save with two shutout innings. He struck out two.

“Will did a good job of pitching in and out of some trouble there a couple times,” Kiefer said. “There was great composure by both today, it’s a tough club over there, Fullerton, they’re a good team, intense and I thought we handled ourselves very well today.

“We have two games next week with Katella and Laguna Hills, we have to go one game at a time, it’s a good league, all the teams are quality, the pitching is good, we’ve done a pretty good job throughout, we’ve lost some close games …… but we’ve played good baseball and we have to just keep going.

“It’s exciting, it’s a good senior class and we’ve had contributions up and down the roster and done a good job of bouncing back, Tuesday (vs. Fullerton) was a tough loss.”

Costa Mesa, which had nine hits, was led by Felix Tiquia, who was 2 for 2 with two runs scored, two walks, three RBI and a home run in the fourth inning.

“It was his first of the year, that was a huge at bat there and a big run,” Kiefer said.

Luke Hobbis was 2 for 3 with a double and an RBI, Ben Quintero was 1 for 3 with a leadoff home run (his first of the year) in the sixth inning and Noah Uribe was 2 for 3 with a run scored.

Costa Mesa pushed across two runs in the first inning off Fullerton starter Evan Terrazas.

Tiquia and Grady Jackson walked, Kash Foti singled to load the bases and Hobbis had an RBI single. Morales put Costa Mesa ahead 2-0 with a sacrifice fly.

Coach Shaun Hill’s Fullerton team cut the lead to 2-1 with a run in the third inning.

Mateo Ramirez led off with a walk and went to third base on a double by Devon Mendez. Leadoff hitter Sammy Chacon drove in the Indians only run on a groundout.

Fullerton also threatened to score in the fourth inning. Caleb Brown led off with a double and was sacrificed to third by Logan Thien. But Morales retired the next two hitters.

The home run by Tiquia in the fourth inning put put the Mustangs ahead 3-1. Then the Mustangs added three insurance runs in the sixth on the home run by Quintero and Tiquia’s two run single.

“It was a nice win, they got the first two of the three-game series so we really wanted to come out and win this one,” Morales said. “We made all the plays we needed to make on defense, the bats were swinging well and me and Wylan did good on the mound.

“It’s always nice to be at the top. We just got to keep winning games, stay up there, we can’t really think about where we are right now, we just got to keep going.”

Gavin Talavera came on in relief of Terrazas, the Fullerton starter, in the third inning and struck out the side in the fifth inning. Zayir Martinez came on to pitch in the sixth inning for the Indians.

—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com