For the first time since opening weekend against Portland, UCLA baseball’s offense came alive, posting double-digit hits in all three games. Ironically, UCLA’s mainstay, its pitching and defense, was on shaky ground all weekend, resulting in the Bruins playing three one-run games.
Free passes, seven errors, multiple baserunning mistakes and missed opportunities at the plate led to No. 13 UCLA (8-7) dropping the first two games of the weekend at home to Pepperdine (12-3) and Houston (11-3), before narrowly edging rival USC (8-6) on the Trojans’ turf in a back-and-forth game on Sunday.
“Every little thing right now is getting us,” coach John Savage said after Saturday’s 4-3 loss to Houston. “Our lack of experience, a walk, an error, a baserunning mistake. We’ve been accustomed to doing that to other clubs for a long time and right now it’s happening to us.”
In Friday’s matchup against the Waves, the Bruins lost control of the game in the sixth inning as their pitchers could not find the strike zone. Three pitchers allowed four walks in the inning, which resulted in the Waves jumping out to a 7-1 lead.
UCLA made a surging comeback in the bottom of the seventh, scoring five runs, led by a bases-clearing double from junior catcher Shane Zeile’s that just missed clearing the left field fence.
After the Waves scored an insurance run in the ninth, Zeile almost willed the Bruins to victory with the team’s first homer of the year, but it wasn’t enough as UCLA lost 8-7.
“It’s really hard to enjoy the positives tonight when we come so close, but yet so far,” Zeile said after going 3-for-5 with four runs batted in against Pepperdine.
UCLA seemed poised for a big day against Houston on Saturday, scoring three runs on five hits in the first inning. However, they would not score the rest of the game.
Junior starting pitcher Grant Watson pitched through an illness and left after six innings with a 3-2 lead, but the bullpen faltered, allowing two unearned runs off of a couple walks, a wild pitch and an error.
The Bruins squandered opportunities to score when freshman second baseman Luke Persico was thrown out at home in the sixth and sophomore left fielder Ty Moore was doubled up at first after Zeile flied out to center in the eighth.
After two dejecting losses, UCLA avoided getting swept and having its record drop under .500 by getting a one-run game to go its way against its biggest rival, USC.
“I think we needed that win. I can’t remember a week where we didn’t win a game,” Savage said. “Like I told the team after tonight’s game, we need to build off each win. We didn’t do a very good job of building off last weekend. … Hopefully with today’s win, we took a step in the right direction.”
The Bruins fell down 2-0 in the sixth, but both teams battled and capitalized on the other’s mistakes to make it a 5-5 tie going into the ninth. Redshirt sophomore right fielder Christoph Bono poked a single through the right side to drive in the go-ahead run, with junior closer David Berg pitching the final 2.2 innings to help seal the 6-5 victory.
“I was fortunate to get it through the hole there,” Bono said. “I didn’t quite hit it as hard as I would of liked to, but got it just enough to get through.”
The Bruins will look to snap a streak of two straight midweek game losses on Tuesday when they host UC Irvine at Jackie Robinson Stadium.