Broadcast Information
 
Radio - KUCI 88.9 FM with Mark Roberts and Tim Becwar All games also available live on the internet at kuci.org and ucirvinesports.com
 
Live stats are available for every Anteater baseball game through ucirvinesports.com and the UCI Sports Front Row app.
 
Around The Horn
 
3:38 - UC Irvine and USC make their games count averaging a 3-hour, 38-minute game length in their 2017 contests. The schools haven't played a game against each other under three hours since 2013 when both games finished under 2-hr, 30-min

4 - In 18 games for the 'Eaters this season, the team that's scored first has gone 10-8 which includes each of the last 4 games and 5 of the last 6 where the team scoring first has gone on to lose the game

3rd - The Anteaters will make their 3rd ever trip to the state of Illinois this weekend with an overall record of 8-1 in the state. The other two trips came in 1973 and 1974 as the Anteaters won the Division II College World Series in Springfield, Illinois each year
 
UC Irvine dropped its first home series of the year losing Saturday and Sunday to Utah Valley. The Anteaters are now winless in their last three series (0-2-1).

UC Irvine and USC square off on Tuesday in the Anteaters' first midweek game in the month of March. UCI is 2-0 in midweek affairs defeating LMU on the road and San Diego State at home

Anteater hitting was at the forefront of the Utah Valley series hitting .305 scoring at least four runs in each contest

Christian Koss was the weekend's catalyst with a hit in all three contests reaching base 10 times in 17 appearances. Koss tripled Friday, had a three-hit game on Saturday, and posted two more Sunday accounting for two of the team's six extra-base hits. He also was flawless in the field accumulating 16 assists on the weekend

Ryan Fitzpatrick continues to hammer the ball with four more hits including a three-hit day on Saturday. His .350 average leads the squad along with his 21 hits, six doubles, and 14 RBI. His on-base streak remains intact as well at 26 games lifting his on-base percentage to .474, second in the conference.

Parker Coss adding some batwork to his consistent fielding with five hits over the weekend and a team-high three runs scored. Coss is now hitting .289 on the season and has a hit in six  straight games

Adrian Damla made the most of his at-bats over the weekend starting twice, but still reaching base and scoring a run in all three, scoring twice, and adding three RBI. Four of his seven hits have gone for extra bases as he stands second on the squad behind Fitzpatrick with a .480 slugging percentage.

The Anteater defense continues to sparkle committing just one error over the weekend and improving its fielding percentage to 0.982, 11th-highest in the nation. The 'Eaters will play the national leader in fielding percentage Tuesday in USC (0.993)

The pitching staff faltered overall with a 5.67 ERA over the weekend. Utah Valley hitters batted .280 in the three games averaging just over six runs a game and were walked 15 times. UVU's nine runs on Sunday and six runs in the seventh inning were each highs for any opponent against the 'Eaters this season

The 'Eater bullpen was up and down with the likes of Taylor Rashi and Jordan Bocko each sparkling in their Friday appearance to earn a win and hold, respectively, but could not duplicate that on Saturday relinquishing a late lead as Rashi received the loss on Bocko's blown save opportunity.

Sean Sparling performed well in each of his outings allowing two baserunners and striking out a pair in his two scoreless innings. Since allowing a run to open the season, Sparling now has tossed scoreless ball in his last 11 innings working on an 0.77 ERA for the season.

Andre Pallante was serviceable in his Friday night start earning his fifth quality start in as many chances this season. He did strike out eight hitters for the fourth straight start, and has now rounded up at least seven Ks in each of this starts this season.

UC Irvine did get sophomore Cole Spear back after missing the first 17 games of the season. Spear retired the only batter he faced to end the seventh inning Sunday.

The Anteaters were without grad transfer and DH Nick Anderson over the weekend as he continues to nurse and injury he suffered midway through Saturday's game at TCU sustained on the basepaths as he attempted to avoid a tag on a force play between first and second base. The 'Eaters are an even 4-4 without him.

UC Irvine has already seen the return of four players that missed all or a considerable amount of the 2017 season:

Pitchers Alonzo Garcia and Sean Sparling were shut down after their first few outings in 2017 - Sparling has returned to allow just one earned run in seven outings and currently sporting an 11-inning scoreless streak. Garcia has been effective in two midweek starts earning the win in the midweek victory over San Diego State. He lasted just 1.2 innings making a start in the second end of Saturday's doubleheader, and made his first relief appearance of the season Saturday against Utah Valley against pitching 1.2 innings.
Catcher Griffin Mazur struggled through a foot injury in 2017, but has returned to see action in 15 games this season earning four starts and recording three hits and three walks including two RBI Saturday on a squeeze play

Reliever Dylan Riddle was also on the shelf after injuring his shoulder in an offseason accident prior to the 2017 season. He's been flawless in four appearances this season allowing just a one hit and a hit by pitch over 2.1 innings of work.

Andre Pallante took home his second Big West Pitcher of the Week award last week after tossing a career high eight innings in a Friday night win while not allowing a run and just five hits to Portland. Pallante lowered his ERA down to 0.33 on the season, best in the Big West and 13th-lowest in the nation. He also tops the conference in strikeouts adding eight more Friday night for 35 on the year, and that stands 27th-most in the country. Pallante is also the conference's leader in WHIP (0.80) and hits allowed per nine innings (5.27), and sits in a nearby second in strikeouts per 9 (11.52)

UCI's 4-0 shutout win in the opener was its first shutout in 73 games dating back to April 29, 2016, a Friday night shutout of Cal State Fullerton. It's the fourth season opener UCI has won with a shutout joining 2008 vs. Nevada, 1992 vs. LMU, and 1972 vs. UCLA. The 'Eaters added a second shutout to begin the Portland series.

The team hit .274 a year ago, second-highest in the Big West, and posted the conference's best on-base percentage of .364, but had a .371 slugging percentage that ranked as the lowest. The Anteaters finished near the top in many offensive categories placing top three in runs, hits, walks, sacrifice flies, and hit by pitch recording the most plate appearances of any Big West squad.
On the pitching end, UCI struggled with the highest ERA in the conference at 5.35 in 2017 and opponent batting average of .299 while issuing 253 walks, highest in the Big West and the program's third-most in a single season.

The defense did stand out committing just 48 errors, the second season in program history where the 'Eaters were charged with less than 50 errors, while leading the conference in putouts and chances finishing with a .978 fielding percentage. The team also turned 55 double plays, second-most in the conference and in program history, and had the second-best percentage of throwing out basestealers throwing out a Big West-best 29 runners.

The Anteaters finished 2017 seventh in the Big West Conference going 9-15, and a 23-33 overall record marks just the second losing season since the program returned in 2002.

Head Coach Mike Gillespie returns for his 31st and final Division I season and 11th with the Anteaters where he is currently the program's winningest coach holding at 370 UCI wins, 1,133 overall

The Anteaters were picked to finish sixth in the Big West according to the preseason coaches poll, however they did land a first-place vote.

The 2017 Anteater schedule included six NCAA Tournament teams and two programs to reach the College World Series. The 2018 schedule has five tournament teams from a year ago on the slate as well as four conference champions overall. Three schools show up in the Baseball America Top 25 to start out the season including perennial midweek foe UCLA at 13, No. 11 Cal State Fullerton who will visit Anteater Ballpark for a series, and TCU at No. 7 that UC Irvine will travel to after winning their series in 2017 with TCU ranked No. 1 in the nation.

The Anteaters are 10-2 in Anteater Ballpark against non-conference ranked opponents winning two of three against No. 1 TCU this year adding to the series win over No. 25 Cal in 2006 and sweeps of No. 23 Baylor in 2013 and No. 8 Washington in 2005.

Since Head Coach Mike Gillespie took over in 2008, UCI has played 106 games against ranked opponents, 84 coming during the regular season, and the 'Eaters have won 48 of those games. Since 2002, UC Irvine is 32-41 overall against ranked Big West programs

USC TROJANS
The Trojans are off to a solid 11-5 start, much like their 12-6 start to 2017 before running into a Pac-12 buzzsaw where they finished last at 8-22 and put up an overall record of 21-34.

USC made a lot of its bread in 2017 at home because of its 6-20 record, and again in 2018 they have an 8-3 home record early on feasting on Villanova, Utah Valley, and Utah. The Trojans have mixed in wins over UCLA, Arkansas, and LBSU while losing a pair of Arkansas and a home game to TCU.

USC's strength have been its pitching, with a 3.89 ERA, a top 100 WHIP, and allowing less than eight hits while striking out eight hitters a game, and the nation's best defense committing four errors in the team's first 16 games.

Transfer Chase Bushor's .341 average leads a team hitting .251. The offense averages just under five strikeouts per game while junior Lars Nootbaar is one of the nation's leader in walks with 18 already.

SOUTHERN ILLINOIS SALUKIS
The Southern Illinois Salukis host the Anteaters in a series that came about after UCI's 2017 opponent, Houston, lost a non-conference weekend with the addition of another conference mate.

It's the Anteaters' third trip to the state of Illinois with each of the first two coming in the form of a trip to the Division II College World Series in back-to-back years, 1973 and 1974. The 'Eaters came back with national titles in each year winning eight of nine contests during the series.

The 'Eaters have had just three games against three Illinois schools in the history of the program starting with Southern Illinois back in 1971 that the Salukis won, 4-1, as part of the Orange County Tournament on the campus of Cal State Los Angeles. UCI and Eastern Illinois squared off during the 1973 CWS, and most recently Illinois visited in 1990 to the tune of a 4-3 UCI win.

Southern Illinois has a steep baseball tradition which includes a pair of College World Series appearances in 1974 and 1977 winning five games over those tournaments. SIU all-time has nearly 1,900 wins over 72 seasons, but last won the competitive Missouri Valley Conference and reached the NCAA Tournament in 1990.

The 2017 Salukis went 27-30 and finished fourth in the conference for a second straight season a year after posting a winning 2016 campaign. SIU if 9-11 thus far with a volatile trio of Connor Kopach (.405, 26 R), Alex Lyon (.400, 23 RBI), and Logan Blackfan (5 HR, 22 RBI) stoking the offense to 6.7 runs per game. The Salukis also represent one of the few squads with more sac flies than UCI with 14. The pitching is running with a 4.75 ERA and do not walk many at just 3.34 per game.

The Salukis specialize on the bases with 56 stolen bases, 4th in the NCAA, in 70 attempts led by Kopach with 16, and throw in Lyon and Addison Fugitt who haven't been caught stealing 11 and 7 bases, respectively