It was the inaugural spring break weekend for Long Beach State students, including the Dirtbags – who played like they would rather be basking in Rosarito sand than infield dirt.

For what it is worth, it was a series of firsts for Long Beach State, traveling up to the Bay area to battle #11 Cal.

For the first time this season, the Dirtbags lost a weekend series at Cal (don’t forget about the series win versus then no 6. Rice and sweeps of no.7 Wichita State, no. 10 UCLA , USC and Hawaii). Put it this way, the Dirtbags are the reason why those teams are no longer top-ten. And despite the losses, the Dirtbags won’t be dropping too far down the rankings, thanks to one of the toughest schedules in the nation (4th in RPI for those of you who need verification).

But yea, for the first time this season, Hill heroes Andrew Liebel (2-1, 1.72 era) and Vance Worley (3-1, 3.83 era) put an L next to their name. It was the first sweep suffered by the Beach. And Sunday’s 4-3 loss was also the first time the Dirtbags out-hit a team and still lost.

Long Beach State fans have been sweep-spoiled this spring. Baseball sweeps series, men’s volleyball sweep sets and softball fresh off its conference-opening sweep of UC Davis. It’s a good time to be affiliated with Long Beach State and broomsticks.

Actually there are a few ways to look at the current losing streak. Yes, most recently the bats had awoke from short-term hibernation and the pitching is bound to give up a few runs here and there (20 in the Cal series). Its kind of like the Memphis men’s basketball program prolific run at an undefeated season. While it would look great on paper – just like winning every series in a season – it may not hurt to get that grimy taste of defeat in your mouth. And just to throw it out there, Memphis is in the Final Four.

And not to foreshadow anything but remember that garbage loss to Western Illinois three weeks ago? Well, that prompted an eight-game win streak for the Dirtbags, a streak that just ended this past Tuesday when they lost their first road game of the season at Pepperdine.

Despite the losses, its important to note the steady development of freshman centerfielder Jonathan Jones, who currently has a 12-game hitting streak. Jones has started the last 12 games and has proven that he can handle D-1 pitching.

Shortstop Danny Espinosa seems to have found his bat again after a quiet couple of weeks. He went hitless in the series opener versus Cal but went 2-3 with two runs scored on back-to-back days to close out the series.

Jason Corder hit a grand slam on Saturday’s game to briefly give the Long Beach State a lead in Saturday’s 10-6 loss.

The Dirtbags will conclude their longest road trip of the season with games against Stanford Monday and Fresno State on Tuesday. They then head back to SoCal to open up conference play against UC Riverside from April 4-6.

Don’t forget to circle April 11-13 when the Dirtbags return to Blair Field to take on UC Irvine, currently ranked as high as no. 7 in the nation.