Running short on outs in the first of their three-game series with East Los Angeles College on Tuesday, the Cerritos College baseball team was able to score twice in the top of the eighth inning and came away with a 5-4 win. The South Coast Conference victory was the 12th in a row for the Falcons (21-4, 12-1), who move into first place in the conference and are just percentage points ahead of second place Long Beach City College. Cerritos will host the Huskies (9-14, 2-9) at 2:00 p.m. on Thursday at Kincaid Field in the second game of their series.

Trailing 4-3 heading into the top of the eighth inning, the Falcons had freshman outfielder Diego Orozco (Long Beach Wilson HS) on second base with two outs after a leadoff walk and was sacrificed to second. Freshman catcher Alonso Reyes (Culver City HS) tied the game with a triple and then came home when freshman designated hitter Juan Garcia (Narbonne HS) reached base on an error.

Freshman pitcher Derek Valdez (Los Alamitos HS), who had one bad inning when East LA scored three times, was in control for the majority of the game. He retired the first six batters of the game before East LA led off the third inning with a pair of singles. A sacrifice bunt advanced both runners, which was followed by an RBI single from Amaris Harrison to get the Huskies on the board. A infield out tied the game at 2-2, while the third run came home after a stolen base by Harrison was followed by an error on the play.

Heading into the bottom of the inning, the Falcons held a 2-0 lead on the strength of two unearned runs. Freshman outfielder Isaiah Rios (St. John Bosco HS) led off the inning by reaching on a error, which was followed by a single from freshman second baseman Dylan Immel (El Segundo HS) and a walk to sophomore third baseman Anthony Bassett (Colegio Bautista de Managua (Nicaragua/Los Angeles Harbor College), which loaded the bases. Orozco drove in the first run with a base hit, while sophomore outfielder Nico Briones (Long Beach Millikan HS) was hit by a pitch to force in the second run. Briones tied the game at 3-3 in the top of the fifth when he reached on an error that plated Rios, who singled with one out.

Valdez (7-0) tossed his second complete game of the season and limited the Huskies to five hits while striking out five batters.