March 10, 2007

The Northeastern Junior College baseball team improved to 9-4 on the season with a 4-2 victory over Otero on Saturday.

Sophomore Jacob Clinton picked up his first win of the season. The right-hander from Golden continued his string of success against Otero. In four starts against Otero last season, Clinton held the Rattlers to four hits, three hits, two hits and two hits; respectively.

"It's really nothing about Otero that makes them a good match-up for me," Clinton said. "It's just that they're a conference opponent. Any time I go out against a conference opponent, they're going to get my all."

Clinton beat Otero twice last season, and he threw five scoreless innings to pick of his first win in his first start of 2007.

"It felt great. It was awesome to be back in the mix of things," Clinton said. "I wanted to do a better job of throwing first-pitch strikes, but there was a little bit of nerves involved. I'm glad everything is back to normal now. It was good to be out there with the boys again."

NJC took a 4-0 lead after four innings behind two RBI singles by Gus Velazquez. Otero scored two runs in the top of the seventh, but lefty Justin Sortino came on in relief of Darren Chavez to pick up the save.