Baseball: Lions claw past UCI in ninth
Through the best and worst of a pre-conference campaign that was a virtual open mound audition, the one thing that had been certain for UC Irvine pitching was the back end with senior closer Calvin Faucher.
The second-year Anteater had been perfect in eight save chances, though he absorbed a loss by surrendering one run on two hits after entering in a tie game against Houston on Friday.
But Faucher blew his first save chance on Tuesday in a 4-2 home setback to Loyola Marymount, leaving UCI (11-10) to enter Big West Conference play on Friday in a season-worst five-game losing streak.
Faucher struck out the first hitter he faced in the ninth, before walking two. The Lions’ Brandon Shearer followed with a single through the right side to tie the score, 2-2, and put runners on the corners.
A wild pitch brought in the go-ahead run and a second wild pitch later gave LMU (14-10) an insurance run.
The Lions maximized their six hits by going three for four with runners in scoring position, while UCI, which had just three hits, was one for 11 with runners in scoring position.
UCI pitchers Chris Vargas, Miles Glazier and Andre Pallante put up zeroes in their 6 1/3 combined innings, and Ryan Johnston allowed a single run in 1 2/3, after Vargas surrendered just one hit in four scoreless innings, the best of his three starts this season.
UCI’s defense, which entered the week with the nation’s top fielding percentage (.986) was flawless again, with junior Cole Kreuter leading the way at second base.
Offense, which has been productive (a .299 team batting average coming in), was limited by four LMU pitchers, who held the top four hitters in the lineup hitless in 13 at-bats, and allowed no hits in 10 at-bats to the bottom third of the UCI order.
Kreuter was two for four with a double, and his single in the fourth inning drove in the first run.
A sacrifice fly by freshman left fielder Devin Pettengill gave UCI a 2-0 lead, with both of the runs rendered unearned due to the first of two LMU errors.
UCI’s pitching corps has been ravaged by injuries, said UCI Coach Mike Gillespie, who reported that pitchers Alonzo Garcia, Sean Sparling and Ben Ritchey were undergoing MRI exams on Wednesday to try to diagnose their maladies.
Junior lefty Cameron Bishop, designated the Friday night starter heading into the season, has been sidelined all year with a strained oblique muscle, and sophomore lefty Dylan Riddle will not return after suffering a broken collarbone in the offseason.
Bishop began throwing last week, but his return and stamina remain question marks.
Junior Louis Raymond, the current Friday starter, leads the staff with three wins, and only Sparling (3.46 in 13 innings) and Faucher (3.86 in 14 innings) have an earned-run average better than 4.00.
UCI, which scored 24 runs to win two of three from then-No. 1-ranked TCU in mid-March, has 22 runs in its last seven games.
The Anteaters attempt to start fresh when they play host to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in the first of a three-game conference-opening series on Friday at 6:30 p.m.
Nonconference
Loyola Marymount 4, UC Irvine 2
SCORE BY INNINGS
LMU 000 001 003 – 4 6 2
UCI 000 200 000 – 2 3 0
Benedetti, Boeke (4), Salzman (6), Paiva (8) and Uhl; Vargas, Johnston (5), Glazier (6), Pallante (7), Faucher (9) and Guenette. W – Paiva, 4-0. L – Faucher, 0-2. 2B – Kreuter (UCI), Caulfield (LMU).
Twitter: @BarryFaulkner5
