Ed Petruska-Contributing Writer Pinal Sports

SIGNAL PEAK – With two of Arizona's top junior college starting pitchers going head-to-head, it was no surprise that Thursday's Game 1 of the Division I Region 1 championship series was a low-scoring affair.

Cochise scored two late runs to pull out a 3-1 victory over Central Arizona at McSwain Field, and now the sixth-ranked Vaqueros (48-11) must win two straight to keep their season alive. Game 2 is Friday at 2 p.m. at CAC.

'There's nothing else to do but go win," CAC coach Anthony Gilich said. "Our guys will be ready. I expect us to come out and win and push it to Game 3," which will be at noon on Saturday if necessary.

Central collected just three hits off Cochise starter Treyjen Meza and reliever Marco Ozuna, none after Blake Avila gave the Vaqueros a 1-0 lead with his one-out RBI single in the fourth. The next 14 batters were retired before Ryan Ball drew a leadoff walk in the ninth.

"The game went as expected," Gilich said. "It was low-scoring. They pushed across a couple late and we couldn't do it."

Meza (14-2) went 7 1/3 innings, striking out nine and walking two. Ozuna, a former Vista Grande High School standout who was the Arizona Community College Athletic Conference pitcher of the year, got the final five outs to notch his 15th save. Ozuna struck out three, including Chase Valentine and pinch hitter Tyrese Johnson to finish the eighth and Avila to end the game.

"Their pitching is their strength, and we knew that," Gilich said. "It went well for them because they only had to use two arms. They don't have a lot of depth on their pitching staff, but their top guys are really good."

The Apaches (44-16) tied the game on Connor Caskenette's two-out RBI single in the sixth. CAC starter Tyler Woessner allowed just four other hits before departing after seven innings. Woessner struck out eight and walked one.

The first batter to face Central reliever Drew Sommers was Alan Ochoa, who got aboard leading off the eighth on strike three when the ball got past catcher Trey Newman. With one out, Caskenette singled and Eduarny Martinez walked to load the bases. The go-ahead run scored on a groundout to first by Aaron Marsh.

Dylan Bradford was hit by a pitch leading off the Cochise ninth. He moved up on Cameron Crotte's sacrifice bunt and came around on Makai DeSoto's triple to right-center – the lone extra-base hit of the game.

The Apaches finished with seven hits, getting two apiece from Caskenette and DeSoto.

Meza issued walks to Ball and Kiko Romero in the first inning, which ended with Cochise turning a 4-6-3 double play.

Ashtin Webb singled with one out in the second, but was thrown out on attempted steal of second.

Central's second hit was Jaylin Rae's single to start the fourth. Rae took second on a wild pitch and scored on Avila's single to center.

The Vaqueros stranded three baserunners, two in scoring position. The Apaches left seven aboard, five in scoring position.