The Arizona baseball team dropped two of three games against Texas State University this weekend at Hi Corbett Field.
Here is how each game went down.
Game one: Arizona wins 7-2
TJ Nichols took the mound for the Wildcats and dominated again, allowing one (unearned) on four hits over 6.2 innings (career-high) to go along with six strikeouts and three walks en route to his second win on the season.
Tanner O’Tremba put Arizona on the board early with a 2-run double in the first inning. He and Daniel Susac each led the way with two hits. O’Tremba drove in 3 runs and Susac scored 4 runs.
Josh Randall and Trevor Long finished the last 2.1 innings to close out the win to open the series.
Game two: Texas State wins 6-2
Garrett Irvin took the mound for Arizona.
An error, stolen base, wild pitch and ground out gave Texas State an early 1-0 lead. The score remained the same in the first four innings of the game.
A single, triple and wild pitch in the fifth inning extended Texas State’s lead to 3-0.
Irvin lasted 5.2 innings, allowing 4 runs (three earned) on four hits to go along with two strikeouts and four walks.
Trailing 4-0, the Wildcats bats looked to rally in the seventh inning. They loaded the bases with nobody out before O’Tremba roped a single to left field to score 2 runs and put Arizona on the board. Susac followed and went ahead 2-0 in the count before grounding into a double play.
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Texas State went on to add 1 more run in the eighth and ninth inning.
Tony Bullard made his season debut, going 1-5 at the plate. The Arizona hitters struck out 16 times which was a season-high.
Game three: Texas State wins 7-3
Texas State got off to another 1-0 lead in the first inning against starter Dawson Netz.
Arizona answered back with 3 runs in the third inning.
Netz was able to settle in with three scoreless innings before a single and home run to open the fifth inning tied the game and knocked Netz out. Texas State went on to score 3 more runs in the frame off reliever Quinn Flanagan, all of them being unearned due to an error by first baseman Noah Turley.
Arizona only recorded five hits on the afternoon with two of them coming in the 3-run third inning. It was a fairly quiet afternoon for the Wildcat hitters for the second game in a row.
“You hate to not defend your home turf,” head coach Chip Hale said. “This is Arizona. We’re very proud of our home field. [Texas State] just came in here these last two days and took it to us. They pretty much out-pitched us, out-defended us, out-hit us and out-coached us.”
“That is the most disappointing thing for me is we just didn’t prepare the guys well enough, so I take the blame,” Hale said.
Up next for Arizona is a game on Tuesday against New Mexico State to close a 10-game homestand with the first pitch scheduled for 6 p.m. MST before the Wildcats head to Berkeley, California to face the University of California, Berkeley to open up conference play.
“I think we have a great culture here where a lot of the guys know that,” O’Tremba said on relaying the message of this being a long season to the younger players. “No one is pointing fingers or blaming anyone. I think every single guy in that locker room takes responsibility. No one’s hitting that panic button and the younger guys, they already understand because we have built that culture.”
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