RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Cal State Monterey Bay took a big first step in Thursday afternoon's NCAA Division II Baseball West Regional opener, rallying from behind twice to upend Dixie State 6–3 at Totman Stadium on the campus of Cal Baptist University.
CSUMB (34–19 overall) advances to the winner's bracket to take on the Cal Poly Pomona/Chico State winner Friday at 7 p.m. Dixie (38–13) will play the loser of that game in an elimination contest Friday at 11 a.m.

"It wasn't pretty: Too many errors," said Otter Head Coach Walt White, who has led his team to the NCAA Tournament for the second time in four seasons. "Fortunately for us—and unfortunately for Dixie—theirs were more costly."

Senior Jacob Cox earned his second win of the season with 3 1/3 innings of stellar relief. The Fresno City College transfer allowed just one hit while fanning a career–high five. Three of those Ks came in the ninth inning when he struck out the side after allowing a leadoff walk.

"We have some tough guys on this team and Jacob was tough today on the mound," said White.

The Otters also sent some tough guys to the plate Thursday, specifically Hayden Duer (Davis HS) and Kevin Davidson (Yucaipa/UC Riverside). The bruise brothers continued their race to claim the CSUMB single season home run record as his own by blasting a pair of solo shots.

Duer was the first to 13 homers when his fourth–inning blast gave the Otters their first lead at 2–1. Davidson followed with his 13th in the sixth inning to tie the game at 3–3.

As White alluded to earlier, however, the Otter power surge merely set the table. Dixie errors provided the main course.

Matt Urakami (San Jose/Branham HS) scored CSUMB's first run after leading off the third inning with a walk thanks to a pair of Dixie errors. He played a central role again in the eighth inning was his grounder to second resulted in a 2–out throwing error that allowed Will Rosado (Clovis East/Fresno City College) and Justin Flores (Clovis West/Fresno City College) to score and break a 3–3 tie.

Josh Heinz (Santa Clarita/West Ranch HS) followed with an RBI single through the left side to plate Myles Hager (Tarzana/Chaminade Prep) with the final run.
 

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NOTABLE: Thursday's win was CSUMB's second NCAA Baseball Tournament victory…the first was an 8–1 victory over Cal State L.A. on May 17, 2013 in St. George, Utah…The home runs by Duer and Davidson give CSUMB 52 for the season…that is 15 more than the previous Otter record of 37 set in 2007 and the most among all six teams competing in the West Regional…prior to this season's Davidson/Duer home run race, Davidson was the only player to reach double figure home runs in a season with 10 in 2015…Davidson's 23 total homers are the CSUMB career record.