January 25, 2008 - 9:16PM

The Arizona Western College baseball team did not get its season - or Friday afternoon's game - off to an ideal start.

Long before sun began to dip down on opening day of the 2008 Caballero Classic, the host Matadors were in the shadows of a five-run deficit and never found a way to shine a light back at ACCAC foe Glendale Community College in an 8-2 loss.

"Baseball is a game of preventing a big inning or getting a big inning, and they won that battle and stayed aggressive the rest of the game," AWC coach John Stratton said.

Glendale's big inning came in the top of the second, batting through their lineup and tagging AWC starter Ian Waldron for five runs on five hits and a pair of walks before the Matadors could get off the field.

"I don't think he was as mentally focused as he has been, as as we got into it there was a mechanical thing," Stratton said. "Our pitching coach noticed he was flying open more than usual for an early outing, but he's been around a lot of innings in this league and it's an opener, so he'll get better."

AWC responded with a pair of runs in the third as Placido Amaya hit a lead-off double and scored on an RBI single from Giovanni Garcia. Garcia would later score via a RBI sacrifice grounder by P.J. Jimenez to make it a 5-2 game.

And while every Matador reached base on Friday, AWC could only produced two base hits in the final six innings and couldn't touch Glendale closer Joe Huenecke, who struck out four straight hitters in the ninth inning to end the game.

"I didn't think we had good swings the second half of the game ,and that's where my concern is," Stratton said. "Part of it was their pitching, and part of it was our young guys losing a little focus and getting down and not finishing the game even though it was still a winnable game."

Eight different Gauchos recorded a hit on Friday, led by Brandon Beal's two singles and three RBI. Glendale starting pitcher Andy Rocha got the win, allowing five hits and two walks through seven innings.

Waldron only gave up two more hits in his final three innings of work. Glendale's final three runs belonged to AWC reliever Brian Petry.

AWC will send Ian Campbell to the mound in the first game of its doubleheader against San Diego City, and Todd Sepulveda in the night game.