King of Dominguez Hills : Baseball: With 8-1 record, Mark Tranberg is ace of Toro staff. But a year ago, right-hander didn’t know if he was ever going to pitch again.

Shortly after 3 this afternoon, Mark Tranberg will walk to the pitching mound at Hart Park in Orange.

It is a spot the 6-foot-4 right-hander should be familiar with. A year ago he intended to pitch there often as a member of the Chapman College baseball team.

But today he will be the starting pitcher for Cal State Dominguez Hills, which shares first place with Cal Poly Pomona in the California Collegiate Athletic Assn.

Tranberg (8-1), who transferred to Dominguez Hills in June after an injury forced him to quit at Chapman, already has defeated his former club, 7-1, on a three-hitter Feb. 22. But that game was in Carson. This afternoon marks his first start in Orange County since he left Fullerton College in 1989.

Dominguez Hills (18-13-1 overall, 9-6 in CCAA play) has vaulted from 17th to 5th nationally in this week’s Division II poll. It has won three of its past five CCAA games and six of eight overall.

Despite the recent success, Toro Coach George Wing sees the series against last-place Chapman (8-25, 4-11) as a potential stumbling block. That’s why Tranberg, the Toro ace, has been moved up in the pitching rotation. Tranberg was originally scheduled to pitch Saturday at noon in the first game of a doubleheader against the Panthers in Carson, but Dominguez Hills is only 4-10 on the road, a record Wing would like to improve.

“Tranberg is a very good pitcher on the road,” Wing said. “We need to get off to a good start in this series. We have a lot of road games ahead of us in the next few weeks.”

A graduate of Anaheim’s Western High, Tranberg has a conference-leading 1.49 earned-run average and six complete games in 11 starts. He also leads the CCAA in strikeouts (68), shutouts (two) and victories.

But it is his composure that makes him the conference’s best pitcher.

“He’s very laid-back,” said Toro pitching Coach John Verhoeven, a former major league pitcher. “He doesn’t let game situations affect him. He does not get flustered.”

Tranberg, a solidly built junior, has command of four pitches and his control has been excellent. He has walked only 19 batters in nearly 80 innings of work.

Tranberg said his arrival and success at Dominguez Hills is fate.

“I’m glad the way things worked out,” he said. “As far as the team is concerned, this is the tightest-knit group of guys I have ever played with. Everyone gets along. There are no egos. As it turned out, getting hurt like I did was one of the best things that I have ever done.”

A year and a half ago, Tranberg wondered if he would ever pitch again. After a 7-2 season at Fullerton College--his first as a pitcher--he chose Chapman College over Cal State Long Beach and Fresno State because, “it would be only my second full year of pitching. I was green around the edges. I needed to pitch every day.”

But after only two bullpen workouts in the fall, he hurt his arm during a pickup football game in September of 1989.

“I was messing around with some friends,” he said. “I dove for the football and as I caught it my right arm hit the ground very hard.”

Tranberg’s injury was diagnosed as a badly bruised shoulder. When he finally returned to baseball practice, each time he raised his arm to attempt a throw, he felt pain. Arthroscopic surgery revealed nothing and when baseball season began in the spring of 1990, Tranberg still could not throw. He eventually left Chapman because “I never thought I would pitch again.”

But his dream persisted. He took a desk job tracking cargo for a cruise line in San Pedro. Then, in June, coerced by a friend, he picked up a ball and tossed it back.

There was no pain.

“I thought, ‘Oh, my gosh. It’s healed,’ ” he said. “It felt better than ever.”

Tranberg, who is majoring in physical education, got on the phone almost immediately. He contacted several schools.

“I would have played anywhere,” he said.

But, because most schools had closed fall enrollment, he found it difficult to relocate. He settled on Dominguez Hills only because it had a late enrollment period.

But it was still up to Tranberg to persuade Wing that he could pitch again.

He visited weight rooms often and “swam all summer” because, “a friend told me swimming helped make pitchers stronger.”

By the fall he was impressing then-Toro pitching Coach Tom Pokorski.

Said Wing: “Tom would say to me, ‘That’s a major league arm.’ But we had to see it in live competition.”

Tranberg opened the season by allowing only three earned runs in a loss to Arizona, a Division I school, before earning seven consecutive victories. He had a no-decision against Cal Poly Pomona on April 1, then defeated Cal Poly San Luis Obispo on April 5.

“Now that we have seen it, it is very reassuring to have,” Wing said.

Tranberg looks back and says that the time he spent away from baseball has helped him this season.

“When I was playing baseball (before the injury) I took it for granted,” he said. “I’ve had it snatched away from me (by the injury) and now I’ve got it back. I don’t want it to go. I’m just so glad to be out there.”

He’ll be out there again this afternoon--this time against Chapman--on a mound he once coveted. His own fate, he said, has worked out well. It is the destiny of the Dominguez Hills baseball team that concerns him now.