Back in the day, the City of Long Beach had their “shockers” that would be a series of landscape-rearranging earthquakes. The city was basically a hard scrapple petro-chemical town. Long Beach State University wasn’t even thought of until almost 1950 (okay 1949), and the town was affectionately called “Iowa by the Sea.” In the heartland, Wichita State University was known as Kansas by Iowa, or Oklahoma, or Nebraska…but never confused athletically with KU or KSU. Wichita is sort of a hard scrapple agra-business town. The common link, well, that would be college baseball. But the similarities don’t last for long.

The Shocker coach is Clean Gene Stephenson, leader of the winningest NCAA Division program in the country over the last 36 years with 1,807 victories; career .735 winning percentage (1,807-652-3) is third highest among active NCAA Division I coaches; career 1,807 wins ranks second-best among active NCAA Division I coaches; one College World Series championship (1989–yes that was the first year the Beach made the show); seven College World Series appearances (1982, 1988,1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1996) and 27 NCAA Regional appearances.

The Niner resume started in 1989 with Dave Snow and right now the mantle hangs heavy on the head of Troy Buckley. His current team lost half of their starting pitching rotation in the fall, and now can’t seem to find their bats. Long Beach has lost six in a row and the offense is still MIA–team batting average a sleepy .232 with only Michael Hill (.340) above .286. The home team is 6-11. The visitors are 11-5 and hitting a lusty .308 with seven players above .300. The Shocks have won four in a row and seven of their last eight.

Last weekend the Dirtbags got 11 hits…all weekend. Arizona State won by a combined score of 21-2 thanks to back-to-back shutouts by Trevor Williams and the combo of Ryan Kellogg, Alex Blackford and Matt Dunbar. Long Beach State finally got on the board in the fifth inning of Sunday’s matchup, but only after giving up a nine-run fourth inning. Not a weekend to remember. The two teams last met last March in Kansas. The Shockers won game one 8-7, but the Dirtbags took the final two by scores of 13-1 and 3-2. Dayne Parker went 8-for-12 in the series to lead the Shockers. Tobin Mateychick earned the win, while Minnis and Cale Elam each took a loss. The 2013 pitching rotation for WSU starts with Elam (RHP , 1-1, 3.26) vs. Shane Carle (RHP , 1-2, 1.82); Saturday it will be the Shocks best lefty (And oh how LB hates lefties) Kris Gardner (LHP , 1-1, 4.91) going against Niner Jake Stassi (LHP , 0-1, 6.00); with the Sunday showdown between A.J. Ladwig (RHP , 2-1, 3.86) vs. David Hill (RHP , 0-1, 4.60).

As much as they struggled at ASU, the fate was similar at LMU on Tuesday, as Long Beach State scored on back-to-back doubles from Richard Prigatano and Eric Hutting, but ultimately lost 4-1. After getting swept by Pittsburgh in Wichita to start the season, the Shockers have rallied to win 11 of their last 13 games. Micah Green is the leading hitter for the Shockers at .385, but the team as a whole is hitting very well. The pitching isn’t as strong, with a 3.97 ERA overall, but the offense has carried Wichita State, ballooning opposing ERA’s to over 6.00 at 6.04. The Shockers hold a 24-22 lead in the all-time series between the teams, who have met annually with one two-year gap since the 1994 season.

Last year, the WSU series served as a springboard for the Long Beach State turnaround, as the Dirtbags rallied from an 8-7 walk off loss to win the next two games, the first of seven straight weekend series victories that helped LBSU finish over .500 from a low-point on that Friday of 6-14.This year after 17 games, the Dirtbags have one streak that stands out–Long Beach State has had excellent success against right-handed starters, going 6-5 overall on the year. The Beach has lost all six games against left-handed starters and that resulted in the team’s sub-.500 record. The left-hander curse includes two losses against Seattle, as well as the last two games against No. 20 Arizona State last weekend.

This weekend around the league it will be UC Riverside at Portland; Sacramento State at UC Santa Barbara; Pacific at Creighton; UC Davis at Seattle; Cal State Fullerton at Oral Roberts; Notre Dame at Cal Poly; and Nebraska at UC Irvine. Next week the Beach faces the guys from behind the orange curtain–the Nutwood Nine we should say. WSU meanwhile has a five game road trip to Hawaii (beats March in the Midwest.)–DR. DAN