MANHATTAN, Kans. --- UC Irvine baseball opened its non-conference series at Kansas State with a 13-8 loss at Tointon Family Stadium Friday night.
TAKING THE LEAD
UC Irvine (21-14, 9-6) got on the board first with a pair of second-inning doubles topped off by
Myles Smith's RBI double.
After Kansas State (20-17) lifted a home run to tie things in the third inning, the 'Eaters countered with a long ball of their own off the bat of
Dub Gleed for a 3-1 lead. The bats stretched the lead with a third run in the fourth and then another two-out RBI in the fifth from
Thomas McCaffrey putting UCI up 5-1
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Nick Pinto was doing his thing on the mound as well allowing the one run through five innings. His day ended with two outs in the sixth and nine strikeouts giving way to
Gordon Ingebritson.
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THE 7TH INNING
The bottom of the seventh began with a popout by
Gordon Ingebritson. The Wildcats bats would wake up in a big way starting with a Jeff Heinrich single. K-State would rattle off eight straight hits to erase the three-run deficit and take an 8-5 lead against Ingebritson and
Tanner Brooks.
Andre Antone became the third pitcher of the inning and got the second out of the frame, but a two-run single added to the lead followed by the second three-run home run of the inning for an 11-run seventh inning and 13-5 Kansas State lead.
FINAL SCORE: KANSAS STATE 13, UC IRVINE 8
The Anteaters made a spirited comeback effort in the ninth with a
Justin Torres two-run home run and
Thomas McCaffrey solo home run, but the rally ended there with a 13-8 loss.
Pinto once again was not part of the decision after a solid start matching his high strikeout total with nine. He and the staff did not issue a walk with 11 strikeouts.
Four Anteater bats had multi-hit days including Torres, Gleed, and McCaffrey who each registered two runs and two RBIs.
The 11 runs are the most allowed in a single inning in program history. It's just the fourth 10-run inning allowed by Anteater pitching.
The series continues Saturday with a 2:00 p.m. start with
Michael Frias on the mound against Kansas State's starter to be determined.
Postgame Thoughts from Head Coach Ben Orloff
"The bullpen's been the strength of the team, but tonight was the type of night where if you told me nine straight players would reach on eight hits, it would be hard to believe that. That's the story of the game when you give up 11 in an inning."
"Pinto was really good. These guys are offensive. The field was playing really offensive, and he really had his way with this lineup on a tough night to pitch so he really impressed. It was really good to see."
"Outside of an 11-run inning we played good. We pitched good, played good defense, pretty good offensively. Would have liked a little bit more to make that a 6-1 or 7-1 game. We just have to come out tomorrow and play a complete nine-inning game. The weather will probably be a lot like they were today. Today though when you strikeout 11 and don't walk a guy and give up 13, it's a bizarre stat line."
