LONG BEACH, Calif. --- UC Irvine baseball were edged out late in Saturday's game against Long Beach State at Blair Field falling, 4-0, to drop the Big West series in the process.
MASTER CLASS
Pitching ruled the day Saturday as starters
Michael Frias and Marques Johnson went toe-to-toe shutting down each other's offenses. Frias ran through the LBSU (17-24, 7-10) offense in the first three innings facing the minimum. The only baserunner was a one-out, first-inning single that
Abraham Garcia-Pacheco cut down on a delayed steal to end the inning.
Johnson commanded the middle innings doing the same to the Anteater (23-17, 9-8) offense letting up just a walk that would also be cut down on the basepaths with a steal attempt to end the fifth inning.
Together, the pair allowed seven total hits with never more than one in a frame. Frias walked just one to Johnson's three, but each had a timely double play as both pitchers had to strand a runner in scoring position twice.
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THE EIGHTH INNING
Frias found a little bump in the road to start the eighth walking the leadoff hitter, and then a flare single over the first baseman put a couple runners on base. A sacrifice bunt put two Dirtbags in scoring position with one out to end Frias' day giving way to
Tanner Brooks.
The native-Texan got a big strikeout to hold serve at the moment, but a weak single just through the right side wipe out any thoughts of a clean inning scoring a pair. Three more hits would push around two more runs for LBSU giving them all they needed for a win and series victory.
FINAL SCORE: LONG BEACH STATE 4, UC IRVINE 0
The Anteater offense has been stagnant now with six total hits over the first two games of this series.
Taishi Nakawake enjoyed a good day at the plate reaching three times including two of the team's hits.
Dub Gleed also had a hit and a walk, but the offense was shutout for the first time this season and third time in the last two seasons, twice now to their Black and Blue rivals.
Frias was issued a loss for a second time this season in one of his top three outings of the season picking up three strikeouts, his second quality start, and a season high of 7.1 innings on 105 pitches.
The loss drops UCI to 9-8 in Big West play, and they've now lost four of their last five series and three of their last four conference series. The series concludes Sunday with a 1:00 p.m. start between
Cameron Wheeler and Juaron Watts-Brown with the contest being televised on ESPNU
Postgame Thoughts from head coach Ben Orloff
"I think LBSU has thrown the ball well, but yeah we've got six hits in 18 innings and we certainly can't win like that. We're really struggling offensively to control the strike zone, and when you can't control the strike zone you're easy to pitch and you can't get many hits. That's the story of the weekend for us right now; our inability to stay over home plate and control the strike zone offensively."
"Frias was really good. It's tough when their guy is throwing the way he's throwing and we're playing offense the way we are because there's no margin for error and thing's have to be going into the 9th or 10th tie at 0-0 for us to have a chance to win. Even Brooks comes into a tough spot and pitches really well against those first two guys, and then stuff kind of falls apart. We pitched it good and we were able to be in the game having scored no runs."
"You always try to win. Today's got a history of it's own. We're trying to win and play well and hopefully show up here on Sunday and piece together a complete game in all phases of the game."
