NEW ORLEANS, La. --- UC Irvine baseball broke a 4-4 tie with a big seventh inning to help secure another series victory, 11-4, Saturday afternoon over Tulane at Greer Field at Turchin Stadium.
- The 'Eaters struck first with a run in the first on a Myles Smith RBI single and two more in the second from singles by Caden Kendle and Anthony Martinez to lead, 3-0
- Tulane crawled back into the game with the long ball as Colin Tuft hit a solo shot in the second and Teo Banks hit a two-run shot in the third to tie things, 3-3
- A squeeze play in the fourth gave the Green Wave the 4-3 lead. Jo Oyama would tie things up in the fifth from a bases loaded grounder to make it 4-4.
- The bats were silent until the seventh inning as UCI faced Tulane's closer Trey Cejhalic and bruised him for six runs as Woody Hadeen started with off with a tie-breaking two-run double. Caden Kendle and Anthony Martinez followed with doubles to put UCI up 8-4 and eventually score six in the inning.
- UC Irvine was hit by a pitch eight times in the game setting a program record, previous at seven that the team reached on three occasions
- The offense pounded out a season-high 16 hits with Kendle and Martinez each getting three with two runs and two RBIs each. All nine starters had a hit and Hadeen and Oyama had two-RBI games as well.
- Brandon Luu on the mound earned his second career win going 2.1 scoreless innings, and fellow freshman Ricky Ojeda followed him with three scoreless of his own to seal the 11-4 win with his first career save
The series finale comes down at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time with
Trevor Hansen on the bump for coach Orloff's crew.
Postgame Thoughts from coach Orloff
"We pitched it really good out of the bullpen, that's where it starts. We did a really good job against Welch. He dominated last week, punched out 10 over five, he was the pitcher of the week for a reason. We did a really good job of getting to him. When he leaves and the score is tied, they need to get 13 outs from the bullpen, I think we were in a pretty good spot. Grinded him down, got to the bullpen, got the big inning, and our bullpen pitched it really good."
"Luu and Ojeda were huge. That's five-plus innings out of two freshmen, and this is a tough place to play. They came in and settled things down and let us get a chance to go ahead and put it out of reach, Those two guys were great. We've thrown six freshmen essentially when you count Kelly and Brooks who have thrown a lot for us already and that's really good for us to see, and those guys are going to keep getting better the more they get in there."
