Arcadia >> Sugar Fish was the longshot going into the Summertime Oaks at Santa Anita on Saturday, and her chances seemed worse only one step into the 1 1/16-mile race.

The 3-year-old filly stumbled badly, almost went nose-first into the dirt, and immediately was last by several lengths in the four-horse field.

“I thought we were done,” trainer Jeff Mullins said, later adding: “You’re just hoping your horse is OK at that point.”

She was OK. With jockey Tyler Baze having only to steer, Sugar Fish got out of last place on the far turn, took advantage of a clear path between frontrunner Jane Austen and the rail to take the lead coming into the stretch. and widened from there.

Her 93/4-length win in the Grade II race was her first at the graded stakes level, Mullins’ first in more than a year and Baze’s first in more than two years.

Sugar Fish paid $13.40. Nothing Like You, a 3-5 favorite, finished second ahead of Jane Austen and Show Card.

“She stumbled pretty good today, but then she got her feet up from under her and just took me,” Baze said.

A daughter of Accelerate, the 2018 Breeders’ Cup Classic winner and North American Horse of the Year, and Madeira Park, a Grade III winner in Canada, Sugar Fish was bought for just $40,000 at a yearling auction in Kentucky by Kim Lloyd and Michael Talla.

The filly named for a chain of sushi restaurants has always had, well, raw talent. But she’s temperamental and didn’t blossom until she was moved from Librado Barocio’s barn to Mullins’ for her 3-year-old season. She broke her maiden while running for a $40,000 claiming price in March, rallied to win an optional claimer in April, and now has a three-race winning streak.

“We were taking a big chance going into this race,” Mullins said of taking on Santa Anita Oaks winner Nothing Like You. “We always thought she was a pretty nice filly. To (almost) fall and overcome and win like she did, it’s pretty special.”

It was disappointing for Bob Baffert, who trains Nothing Like You and last-place Show Card.

Baffert’s success Saturday came at Saratoga, on the Belmont Stakes undercard, where National Treasure ($4.70) and jockey Flavien Prat led from start to finish to win the $1 million Grade I Metropolitan Handicap by 61/4 lengths.

Earlier at Saratoga, Baffert’s Prince of Monaco, last year’s Del Mar Futurity winner, ran second as an 8-5 favorite and Imagination was seventh in the $500,000 Grade I Woody Stephens Stakes won by Book’em Danno.