It has been 20 days since the Bruins began their baseball season, and they finally will be playing games outside of Southern California.
No. 11 UCLA (8-4) heads north to battle the Cal Poly Mustangs (6-6) in San Luis Obispo starting tonight. The three-game set at Baggett Stadium will be the first series away from home for the Bruins so far in the young season.
Cal Poly poses a tough challenge for UCLA. The Mustangs have series wins on the road at both Alabama and Washington and have also matched up well against two highly regarded ball clubs, San Diego and San Diego State.
“Anyone that knows college baseball right now knows that Cal Poly is a program that competes real well in the Big West Conference,” coach John Savage said. “They’re well-coached, and we have a tremendous challenge ahead of us against a team that has already played a lot of good teams.”
Savage hopes that junior left-hander Tim Murphy (2-0) will start the series off right on the mound tonight. So far this season, the southpaw has a pair of wins and a magnificent ERA of 0.38. In his start Friday against Saint Mary’s, Murphy struck out a season-high 11 batters in seven scoreless innings. His strong performance pushed his scoreless streak to 19 and a third consecutive innings.
“(Murphy) has been fantastic,” Savage said. “He’s really been our ace and been the guy that we’ve gone to. He’s been our leader to start the weekends off, so we’re looking for him to stay hot.”
On Friday evening, freshman right-handed pitcher Dan Klein (2-2) will take the hill to make his second collegiate start. Klein, who has a team-high four decisions this season, is making a case to become the midweek starter.
In the series finale on Saturday afternoon, sophomore lefty Gavin Brooks will be making his third start of the season.
Brooks, who entered the season as ace of the weekend starting rotation, was shaky in his return from a blister problem, giving up three runs in four innings Saturday against Saint Mary’s.
After failing to sweep Saint Mary’s in the series finale last weekend, UCLA had a encouraging beginning to this week, defeating the Pepperdine Waves, 11-3, Tuesday night at Jackie Robinson Stadium.
The Bruin offense, which has been inconsistent so far this season, tagged three Pepperdine pitchers for 14 hits. Included in the offensive barrage were home runs by designated hitter Cody Decker, second baseman Alden Carrithers and right fielder Gabe Cohen.
“It was without question the best game we’ve played all season,” Savage said. “We had good, sound defense, solid pitching and had a lot of quality at bats. There were just many positives that I think we can build off.”
The Bruins combined an overwhelming offensive attack with an effective outing by left-handed pitcher Justin Uribe, who was making his first collegiate start.
The sophomore from Santa Ana, who usually starts in the outfield, pitched five scoreless innings en route to earning his second victory of the season.
Although the week has begun positively, the team looks to become more consistent with conference play starting later this month.
“This series is very important,” Savage said. “We need to build an identity on the road. Any championship team has to build identity and toughness from the road. This will be tremendous and I’m really looking forward to see how we respond.”