Costa Mesa, Calif. - Boasting one of the most picturesque home field advantages in all of baseball, the #12-ranked Point Loma Nazarene Sea Lions remained in the hunt for a conference title and forced a second place tie with the ninth-ranked Vanguard Lions with a 12-5 and 9-3 doubleheader sweep at Carroll Land Stadium Saturday afternoon in San Diego.

Vanguard (26-9 overall, 17-7 GSAC) not only falls into a second place tie with Point Loma but loses the end-of-the-season tiebreak with the Sea Lions who defeated the Lions three of the four games they played this week.

The Sea Lions (28-9-1, 17-7) jumped all over Lion starter Javier Perez in game one scoring four in the bottom of the first inning. Left fielder Rashad Taylor ignited his three-hit performance with an RBI double to start the rally.

After a Tyson Leighton RBI single and a two-run double from Jason Dovel sparked a three-run fourth for Vanguard, an error in the top of the fifth allowed the Lions to scratch to within one. That, however, is the closest they would get.

Point Loma exploded for seven runs in the bottom of the fifth off of Peter Birdwell. Jeff Fox connected for a three-run shot, his fourth of the year, before Taylor would pull off a copycat performance later in the inning when he launched his 12th homer of the year, another huge three-run shot that put the game out of reach.

Fox and Taylor each had three hits and four RBIs in game one. Perez went just the one inning for Vanguard to fall to 1-3 on the season. Chad Blauer used the offensive explosion to his advantage to improve to 8-1 on the year as he went seven innings giving up four runs (three earned) on six hits, four walks and four strikeouts for Point Loma.

Dovel's two RBIs paced a Vanguard attack in which nine batters each tallied a hit in game one.

Despite trailing 2-0 after an inning in game number two, Vanguard took its only lead of the afternoon with a three-run top of the second, all with two outs. Dovel continued his hot hitting by belting a solo shot, his third of the year, and then was followed by an RBI single by Zachary Leighton and a run-scoring balk off of Sea Lion starter Bobby Ross.

Point Loma responded quickly, however, in the bottom of the second as center fielder Allen Boyer would smack his tenth homer of the year, a two-run shot that would give the Sea Lions the lead for good.

Ross settled down nicely for Point Loma scattering just two more hits the rest of the way in a complete game performance in which he struck out nine and allowed just one earned run over seven innings to improve to 3-2 on the year.

Lance Abbott (2-2) took the loss for Vanguard going four innings. Abbott gave up only five hits but just two strikeouts and five walks spelled disaster and seven earned runs given up.

Along with Boyer, Tyler Kuehl and Kevin Newberg had multi-RBI games for Point Loma while Newberg and Steven Winnick added two hits apiece as well.

Vanguard, who at one point had won six of eight, has now dropped three of its last four and Wednesday they travel to face the 21st-ranked Sunbirds for a 2 pm doubleheader as part of a crucial home-and-home doubleheader four-game series next week.

Game 1 Boxscore

Game 2 Boxscore