AZUSA, Calif. -- Azusa Pacific secured an automatic berth into next week's NCAA West Regional, which will be held in Nampa, Idaho, by winning all four of its games at the PacWest AQ Pod Series, featuring the conference's three pod champions on Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the Cougar Baseball Complex.

The Cougars opened the series with a 14-2 win over Academy of Art on Thursday to set the tone for a weekend in which they ended with 43 runs scored in four games. The Cougars scored eight runs in the first inning of the series with home runs by Spencer Rasmussen and Brett Soria to put the rest of the field in catch-up mode for the rest of the weekend. AJ Woodall threw eight innings with just one earned run allowed to protect the lead and give the Cougars the early lead in the series. Academy of Art bounced back quickly to take the second game of the series 8-5 against Hawai`i Hilo.

On Friday, the Cougars got their second win, defeating Hawai`i Hilo 11-7. Azusa Pacific had five different players hit home runs in the game. The Vulcans put six runs on the board in the final four innings with two home runs of their own, but Korey Shepard came into the game to retire the last two batters and secure the second victory. The nightcap went to Hawai`i Hilo, which defeated Academy of Art 8-7, giving both teams one win against each other. That meant Azusa Pacific needed to win only one of the two games on Saturday to take the series.

In the first game on Saturday, Azusa Pacific earned a 9-0 victory against Academy of Art to officially clinch a spot in the NCAA West Regional. The Cougars hit three home runs in the first inning and Omar Lopez made it four with a solo shot in the fifth inning. Brendan Dixon threw the first 5.1 innings of the shutout with only three hits allowed for his first win of the season. That clinched the automatic qualifier, but the Cougars went on to win one more game to finish the series, topping Hawai`i Hilo 9-2 in the series finale. The Cougars' reserves scored six runs in the fifth inning and six pitchers combined for only four hits allowed in the win.

Hawai`i Hilo's Casey Yamauchi led all players in hits in the series with eight. Rasmussen tallied 17 total bases with four home runs and eight RBIs in the series. Casey Dykstra and Lopez each hit two home runs for the Cougars, and Academy of Art was led by Noah Daubin, who also belted two home runs and finished the series with 12 total bases.