San Diego (8-6, 0-0 WCC)  •  Cal State Fullerton (4-10, 0-0 Big West)
Fowler Park (1,700) • San Diego, CA
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SAN DIEGO — With a series win in its first road trip of 2022 under its belt, San Diego baseball (8-6, 0-0 WCC) will return home on Tuesday for a midweek non-conference matchup with Cal State Fullerton (4-10, 0-0 Big West).

First pitch at Fowler Park is set for 6 p.m.

The game will be streamed live on the WCC Network with Jack Cronin and Braden Surprenant on the call, and live statistics will be provided on USDToreros.com.

LAST TIME OUT
• The Toreros followed up a Tuesday night win at home versus UC San Diego by taking two of three at Grand Canyon last week.

• USD beat the Tritons 2-0 on Tuesday, lost the first game to the Lopes on Friday by a 6-5 margin, then took the next two in a row at GCU on Saturday and Sunday by scores of 7-1 and 7-5 to secure the series win.

ALL-TIME SERIES VERSUS CAL STATE FULLERTON
• The Toreros are 18-63-3 against the Titans all-time but are 6-4 in their last 10 matchups versus CSUF, including a win in last year's season series that saw San Diego take three of five.

• USD began their matchups with Fullerton with a pair of wins at Fowler Park on February 26 and 27, beating the Titans by scores of 6-1 and 6-5 before dropping what was then slated to be the series finale on February 28 by a 5-1 margin.

• The series continued in early March, however, with an impromptu two-game set that came to fruition after Pepperdine was forced to postpone its trip to Fowler Park due to COVID-19 related protocols within their program.

• In place of its series with the Waves, San Diego made the trip up to Fullerton on a Friday and dropped a tough 3-1 decision at Goodwin Field before welcoming the Titans back to Fowler Park, where the two teams played before a national audience on ESPNU.

• USD won the matchup — which marks the most recent meeting between the two teams — in decisive fashion, prevailing by a score of 8-2 behind a monster game at the plate from eventual WCC Player of the Year Thomas Luevano and seven innings of one-run ball from redshirt sophomore righty Conner Thurman, who scattered four hits and struck out seven en-route to receiving the win.

• The Toreros are 7-3 versus Cal State Fullerton at home since Fowler Park opened in 2013.

FOR STARTERS (PROBABLE)
• Graduate lefty Ian Churchill is set to start for the Toreros on Tuesday after not pitching in USD's weekend series at GCU.

• Churchill last appeared on March 6th versus Dallas Baptist, going 3.2 innings while surrendering two runs, a walk, and four hits while striking out two in what marked his third total start of the season.

• For the year Churchill is 0-2 with a 9.75 ERA in 12.0 total innings pitched, with nine total strikeouts to his credit against just three walks.

• The 6-2 lefty joined the Toreros from the University of Arizona, where he won the 2021 Pac-12 Championship with the Wildcats and appeared in the Tucson NCAA Super Regional versus Ole Miss along with a College World Series outing against Stanford.

• While in Tucson he recorded 13 relief appearances and went 0-1 with an 8.56 ERA.

• Prior to Arizona, he attended Santa Barbara City College, where he was named the 2019 California Community College Athletic Association Pitcher of the Year and was tabbed as a first team All-American.

SIM NAMED WCC PLAYER OF THE WEEK
• Sophomore infielder Kevin Sim earned his first career West Coast Conference Player of the Week honor for his performance against UC San Diego and Grand Canyon, the conference announced on Monday afternoon.

• Sim went 5-for-15 (.333) across a mid-week matchup with the Tritons and a three-game road set versus the Lopes. The San Diego, California native (Torrey Pines High School) had two doubles, two home runs, three RBIs, three walks, and four runs scored across the four-game stretch, including a 3-for-4 performance in Friday night's game versus GCU and towering home runs in both Saturday's and Sunday's contests, the latter of which gave San Diego its first lead of the afternoon, keyed off a big rally, and pushed the Toreros to a 7-5 win.

• For the season Sim is batting .377 (20-for-53) with four doubles, a team-high seven home runs and 20 RBIs, a remarkable .849 slugging percentage, and a .468 on-base percentage, second to teammate Angelo Peraza for the team high by just .001.

• He enters Tuesday night's action on a three-game hit streak.

COSTELLO KEEPS CRUSHING IT
• Sophomore Jack Costello has picked up right where he left off this season after a dynamic college debut a year ago, hitting safely in all but one of the Toreros' 14 games so far in 2022.

• The Simi Valley, California native began the campaign on a 10-game hit streak (one that stretched to 15 games if you count his final five contest of 2021).

• After finally going hitless last Tuesday night versus UCSD, Costello promptly rebounded with knocks in all three of USD's games at Grand Canyon over the weekend, including a pair of multi-hit performances on Saturday and Sunday.

• He was 6-for-14 (.428) with a pair of doubles, a run scored, and three RBIs in the series, with three hits on Saturday, and two more on Sunday as he helped the Toreros to a pair of wins over the Lopes.

• Costello has hit safely in 43 of the 55 games he played in so far at USD.

• Since going hitless in his first two college appearances on February 21 and 27, 2021, he's been hitless just 10 times, and 25 of his 55 college games so far have resulted in a multi-hit performance, including eight multi-hit games out of 14 total contests so far in 2022.

• For the season Costello is batting .397 (23-for-58) with five doubles, two home runs, 13 RBIs, and 34 total bases. His .586 slugging percentage is second to only Sim, and his .429 on-base percentage is fifth.

RICKETTS HEATING UP
• Junior catcher Caleb Ricketts continued to heat up last week, going 7-for-14 (.500) with a run scored, an RBI, a walk, and a home run across a game versus UCSD and three at GCU.

• The Newport Beach, California native was 2-for-3 on Tuesday, 1-for-4 on Friday, 1-for-3 on Saturday, and 1-for-4 on Sunday, following up Kevin Sim's go-ahead solo shot with a longball of his own to extend the San Diego lead.

• For the season he's batting .264 (14-for-53) with a pair of home runs, three doubles, a triple, and six RBIs.

ALLEN KEY ACROSS THE BOARD
• Sophomore outfielder Dustin Allen put together an impressive performance last week, going 4-for-11 (.363) across all three games at GCU with a run scored, three RBIs, and a handful of key hits.

• On Friday, he extended the San Diego advantage by sending a ground ball to short that plated Camden Vasquez, on Saturday, he drove in another run with a single through the right side, and on Sunday, he grinded out a seven-pitch at-bat to a full count before he shot another single through the left side for another RBI, then singled yet again to center field for a big insurance run.

CARR MAKES USD DEBUT
• Redshirt sophomore Kyle Carr made his USD debut on Friday at GCU and picked up his first hit, run scored, run batted in, and stolen base over the weekend.

• Carr (San Marcos High School) missed all of last season and the beginning of this season due to injury, but was named the Perfect Game WCC Preseason Freshman of the Year in January.

BEST IN THE WEST (COAST CONFERENCE)
• From the beginning of the 2019 season until now, no team in the West Coast Conference has had a better record than San Diego baseball. Combining their 2019 record (32-21), their abbreviated 2020 totals (12-4), their 33-12 mark in 2021, and their 8-6 record so far in 2022, the Toreros are a conference-best 85-43 (.664) in that 128-game span.

•Next best within that timeframe are Gonzaga (83-55, .601), and Saint Mary's (84-61, .579).