Lopez, Buck Earn CCAA Weekly Honors
SAN MARCOS, Calif. – After helping Cal State San Marcos baseball to its first 3-0 start in program history, Cougars Mike Lopez and Grant Buck have been tapped as the CCAA Baseball Pitcher and Player of the Week for Jan. 28-Feb. 3.
Lopez, a redshirt senior from San Diego, opened the season with aplomb, tying the Cal State San Marcos single-game record for strikeouts. Fanning 12 batters in the 6-0 victory over MSU Denver, Lopez earned the win after he tossed eight scoreless innings and allowed just four hits with 90 pitches. Lopez is just the second CSUSM pitcher in program history to record 12 strikeouts in a game as former Cougar James Dykstra did so on two occasions in 2012 and 2013.
Buck backed up the efforts from Lopez with power at the plate, slugging out a home run to score two in the opening game in his debut as a Cougar. The senior transfer from Carlsbad kept the bat hot throughout the series, blasting a three-run jack in the series finale to cap the weekend. All told, Buck finished the series with two home runs and five RBIs while tallying three hits, nine total bases, a 1.000 slugging percentage, a walk and a hit-by-pitch in the Cougars’ three wins over MSU Denver in the opening weekend of the 2019 season.
This is Lopez’s first CCAA Pitcher of the Week nod, and it’s the first time Buck as been selected as CCAA Player of the Week.
Cal State San Marcos is set to host Concordia Irvine in another weekend of non-conference action on the diamond. The three-game series between the Cougars and Eagles is slated for Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with one game on the docket each afternoon.
