| Baseball |
|---|
| Saint Mary’s — 3 |
| UCLA — 2 |
With two outs in the inning, bottom of the ninth, down one run, UCLA junior shortstop Roch Cholowsky steps up to the plate…
The Bruins find themselves in a familiar situation. The go-ahead run, courtesy of junior second baseman Phoenix Call, was on base. However, it seems as if the Bruins’ walk-off magic has finally run out.
On Friday afternoon at Jackie Robinson Stadium, the No. 1 UCLA Bruins baseball team (51-7, 28-2 Big Ten) suffered a 3-2 loss against the No. 4 Saint Mary’s College, or SMC, Gaels (35-25, 15-12 West Coast) in the NCAA Regional tournament.
Today’s starter, sophomore right-handed pitcher Wylan Moss, looked terrific on the mound, bringing a good mix of heaters and off-speed pitches. Moss was well-equipped for today’s game, effectively getting ahead in the count and limiting the St. Mary’s batters from getting on base.
Moss was very efficient with his pitches, being able to get through five innings on 68 pitches, allowing two earned runs, three hits, and tallying four strikeouts.
The rest of the bullpen was also quite effective, especially junior right-handed flamethrower Cal Randall and freshman right-hander Zach Strickland. Randall tallied two strikeouts and only allowed one hit, while Strickland had a 1-2-3 inning and retired each batter he faced from the Gaels’ lineup.
The majority of today’s game was a fierce pitcher’s duel between Moss and the Gaels’ right-handed starting pitcher, John Damozonio. The runs that scored in today’s game were numerically few, but many of these runs came off of big hits and made a massive impact.
It took a while for the Bruins to get a hit on Gaels’ ace Damozonio, coming off a bunt by junior left fielder Dean West. It was a daunting task to try and get through Damazonio, considering how dominant he was. He battled through one of the best offenses in college baseball, completing seven innings on 105 pitches and tallying six strikeouts.
Much of Damazonio’s success today came from his versatile pitch mix, including a “[four seam] fastball, two-seam fastball, cutter, slider and changeup.”
That versatility helped him get through the aggressive Bruins lineup. When talking about how he threw his cutter, Damazonio said, “I don’t know if I love how I threw it today, and it was kind of cool because then I had to go to other pitches like the slider, and I threw a couple of changeups… and I kept going back to it.”
In terms of offensive action, today’s game, it was the Gaels who struck first at the top of the fourth inning, with Jacob Johnson hitting a solo home run off Moss to deep right field.
However, the Bruins answered right back with a solo home run of their own during the bottom of the fourth by junior third baseman Roman Martin, crushing a pitch to right center field to tie up the game. The Bruins’ offense showed the audience that there was indeed life left in those bats.
In the fifth inning, the Bruins continued to build off of their bats’ momentum as Cholowsky hit a RBI lineout to left field to drive in freshman designated hitter Trey Gudoy to take the lead and make it a 2-1 ballgame.
It would not take long for the Gaels to respond when, in the sixth inning, Makoa Sniffen hit an RBI double down the right field line, allowing Tanner Griffith to take home plate and tie the game up at two runs apiece.
Top of the ninth. Game tied. Sophomore closer Easton Hawk, who has been lights-out this year for the Bruins, takes the mound in an effort to keep the game tied at 2-2.
But then, Johnson, for the second time today, stepped up to the plate and blasted a solo home run to give the Gaels the lead with a solo home run hit to deep right field.
According to UCLA’s head coach, John Savage, this home run was “a routine fly ball… it was a late May, [Jackie Robinson Stadium] fly ball that leaves the ballpark,” likely referring to the lower air density of summer.
What seemed to be a routine fly ball turned out to have too much carry to it. The ball was just barely out of reach for senior right fielder Jarrod Hocking, who was filling in for the injured redshirt junior right fielder Payton Brennan. SMC would now have a one-run lead entering the bottom of the ninth, 3-2.
According to junior catcher Cashel Dugger, the home run pitches that were thrown were good pitches, but the SMC lineup was able to get ahold of those pitches: “It was just two fastballs — they’re good pitches, and it’s where we wanted them. You kind of got to tip your cap a little bit.”
In the bottom of the ninth, the Bruins could not continue their streak of walk-off wins, with Cholowsky flying out to center field to end the game. The Bruins had lost in the playoffs for the first time during this year’s postseason run.
Although the Bruins lost today’s game, Coach Savage reiterated how the Bruins’ lineup had taken a hit due to injuries, but that the Bruins will continue to fight hard to win on Saturday and beyond.
“We’ve been playing on that tight rope a little bit…We lose Brennan. We lose [sophomore second baseman Aidan Aguayo], we didn’t have Will [junior center fielder Will Gasparino]… but at the same time, we need to make sure that we get back at it again tomorrow.”
The Bruins will play a Saturday afternoon elimination game on May 30 at 1 p.m. PT at Jackie Robinson Stadium, where they will be facing Virginia Tech, who faced Cal Poly in the second matchup of Friday’s two-game slate.
