IRVINE, Calif. --- UC Irvine was firing on all cylinders en route to a 10-2 Tuesday night victory over Loyola Marymount in Anteater Ballpark.
After the Anteaters (13-10) saw an early 1-0 lead slip away on a two-run LMU (12-12) single in the top of the third, the tide quickly turned on the bat of Tuesday night's hero
Nick Anderson.
The graduate student pelted a two-run shot deep into the night in left center for his first Anteater home run to leapfrog LMU back into the lead, 3-2. The hit sparked the 'Eaters who weren't done in the inning. After a
Ryan Fitzpatrick walk and a popup to make it two outs in the third, UCI hit the gas with a
Parker Coss single and
Christian Koss walk to load the bases. UCI would boost its advantage from a balk, walk, hit by pitch, and another walk scoring three more runs without even lifting a bat as LMU needed to resort to its third pitcher of the inning of fifth in the first three innings to finally end the inning with UCI on top 6-2.
After that, the Anteaters turned to the bullpen relieve
Louis Raymond making his first midweek start and not allowing an earned run through his three innings of work.
Jake Lachemann sat down all six batters he faced over two innings, and
Cole Spear followed suit issuing a walk, but getting five of his six outs on strikeouts.
UCI opened up the bats once again in the sixth inning lacing four straight hits, three for doubles which all drove in runs off the bats of Anderson, Fitzpatrick, and
Cole Kreuter to make it a 10-2 game.
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The bullpen charged on with scoreless innings in the eighth and ninth from
Alonzo Garcia and
Nick Anderson to complete the 10-2 victory.
Lachemann came through with the win, the first of his career, spurned on the bullpen that allowed two baserunners and struck out 11 Lions over six innings of work.
The offense followed Anderson's suit putting up his second straight three-hit game driving home two and scoring two. Kreuter also drove home two, and Fitzpatrick reached base in all four at-bats from an RBI double and three walks crossing home plate three times as well.
LMU was held to just five hits from five different players. Jamey Smart provided the only offense with a two-run single. LMU's pitching went through seven pitchers to combined to walk eight hitters, hit three, hurl four wild pitches, and were called for a balk. Holden Christian drew the loss allowing five runs over 0.2 innings. CJ Fernandezees threw three shutout innings adding four strikeouts.
UCI gains some momentum with the win now at 4-0 on the season in midweek contests, and will ride that into the weekend with the start of Big West play Thursday night at 6:30 p.m. welcoming in Hawai'i. Thursday and Friday night will each be broadcast on ESPN3Â with the finale coming Saturday at 2:00 p.m. prior to the Easter Sunday holiday.
