DAVIS, Calif. --- UC Irvine baseball had another big day on offense for a 13-2 win Saturday at Dobbins Stadium over UC Davis.
Right out of the gate, the 'Eaters (34-17, 15-11) slapped a five-spot on the board in the first after the first five batters all reached and scored.
Anthony Martinez's booming double off the wall brought the first run around, and
Will Bermudez capped the inning with a two-out RBI single.
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Nick Pinto on the bump started off strong as well with a zero in the first inning and shut out the Aggies (17-33, 7-19) through four innings. For the second time in his last three starts, he finished seven innings for the 'Eaters putting up another quality start with two runs allowed, one walk, and six strikeouts.
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The bats continued to build their lead with crooked numbers in four innings total on the day starting with two more in the second. The fifth inning saw all the scoring with two outs as
Jo Oyama laid down a perfect two-out drag bunt for the single and UCI's eighth run.
Anthony Martinez kept the inning going with a two-out single the other way to drive in two more for a 10-0 lead. UCI put up some insurance in the seventh with
Dub Gleed slipping a single through the left side for two RBIs, and
Myles Smith driving in his third run of the day on a chopper up the middle for finish the 13-2 victory.
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"Five in the top of the first and then you get a zero and continue to add on is what we want," head coach
Ben Orloff said of Saturday's game. "For
Nick Pinto to go deep and has us be in good position tomorrow too is huge."
Pinto matched Stanford from a day earlier posting his team-high sixth victory. His six strikeouts moved him past three Anteater legends on the day staring with Chris Nicoll, then Andrew Thurman, and finally Andrew Morales for 227 career strikeouts sitting him at 11th on the all-time Anteater list.
"This is luxury of getting good starting pitching these past two days along with the offense we've gotten allows us to not really have to use our big guns and now we have everybody available for Sunday."
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All nine hitters in the starting lineup collected a hit of the 16 the team produced. Six 'Eaters had multi-hit days led by
Luke Spillane's three while also swiping two bases.
Anthony Martinez had three RBIs to up his team high to 58 on the year, and was joined by a three-RBI day from
Myles Smith who had two sacrifice flies for the team to give the national leaders in the stat 45 on the year.
Jo Oyama scored four times among his five times on base that included two hits, two walks, a HBP, and a stolen base.
"A complete offensive day - 16 hits, extra bases, hit by pitches were big in that first inning, one inning with some stolen bases, two-out drag - we're a hard team to play when we can do a lot of different things like that."
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The win helps the 'Eaters continue to rise as it approaches the end of the regular season with four games left to play now 34-17 overall. At 15-11 in Big West play, UCI is in a tie for fifth place now with the loser of today's Hawai'i at CSUN matchup. The series at UC Davis concludes with another 1:00 p.m. first pitch and UCI's starter yet to be determined.
