‘Eaters lack offense

UC Irvine senior starting pitcher Elliot Surrey compiled arguably his best body of work in four strong home appearances this season. But he and the Anteaters were done in by an Adonis.

Adonis Morrison, a sophomore second baseman starting for just the third time all season, delivered a two-run double in the seventh inning to break a 1-1 tie and give visiting UC Riverside a 3-1 Big West Conference baseball victory Friday.

Surrey, who had not allowed an earned run in three previous home starts, extended that streak to 22 2/3 innings, before three straight singles in the fourth knotted the score at 1-1.

Surrey, who did not walk a batter, went on to post a career-best 10 strikeouts. But his final strikeout, eclipsing his previous career-best by one, came one batter after Morrison smacked the first pitch following a mound visit by UCI pitching Coach Danny Bibona, off the left-field fence. The shot drove in Colby Schultz and Mark Contreras, who had singled ahead of Morrison.

Surrey, who in his last two road starts has surrendered 17 hits and 13 earned runs in nine combined innings, taking the loss each time (at Tennessee and at Hawaii), allowed nine hits. But none of those hits had much muscle behind them, until Morrison, who had a pinch-hit, game-winning two-run single in the eighth inning of the Highlanders’ conference-opening home win over UC Davis on April 1, launched his fifth hit in 15 at-bats this season.

Four of those five hits were doubles, and Morrison’s blow was the visitors’ lone extra-base hit Friday.

UCI (16-10, 1-3 in conference) had just four hits, one for extra-bases, as junior shortstop John Brontsema set up the hosts’ lone run with a one-out triple in the first inning. Sophomore sensation Keston Hiura plated Brontsema with a sacrifice fly to right field, but it proved to be a mere flesh wound for UC Riverside starter Austin Sodders.

After Brontsema’s triple, Sodders faced 18 batters without allowing another hit, at one point retiring 12 straight until Hiura singled to open the seventh. UC Riverside Coach and former Angels closer Troy Percival said he instructed Sodders to work exclusively from the stretch in the second inning.

Senior first baseman Mitchell Holland followed with a single to left and, after Adam Alcantara moved both runners up with a sacrifice bunt, pinch-hitter Jonathan Muñoz was hit by a pitch to load the bases.

But Highlanders senior reliever Keaton Lynch struck out pinch-hitters Cameron Bishop and Wyatt Castro to end the threat.

Hiura, who was hitless in his previous eight at-bats before singling in the seventh, possibly his worst stretch as an Anteater, singled again to open the ninth to chase Leach.

Holland was walked on four pitches by sophomore Ryan Lillie, and Alcantara bunted them over once again.

But Muñoz struck out and Alex Guenette flied to right to end the game.

“I thought [Surrey] was outstanding,” UCI Coach Mike Gillespie said. “It’s easily his best performance this year and we’ll take that every time.

“The issue was offense, really. We got dominated at the plate. We did face good arms, all three of their guys had good arms, but the thing that is frustrating is, we had reason to know almost every single pitch that was coming. So, to not be able to do more than that … I have to believe four, five, maybe six of our outs were on pitches we chased. To try to suggest there’s anything impressive about the offense is putting perfume on a pig.”

The four hits tied a season low for UCI, which had a season-best 19 hits in a 14-4 win at Hawaii on Sunday.

Riverside, which won just for conference games last season, improves to 13-15, 3-1.

The two teams are scheduled to resume the series Saturday at 2 p.m.

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Big West Conference

UC Riverside 3, UC Irvine 1

SCORE BY INNINGS

UCR 000 100 200 – 3 9 0

UCI 100 000 000 – 1 4 1

Sodders, Leach (7), Lillie (9) and Worden; Surrey, Ritchey (8), Glazier (9) and Reitano, Guenette (8). W – Sodders, 3-2. Surrey, 2-3. Sv – Lillie (2). 2B – Morrison (UCR). 3B – Brontsema (UCI).