Photo courtesy of UVU Athletics
Taking on Grand Canyon University over the weekend, the UVU baseball team struggled at home going 0-3 in the series. The Wolverines committed 10 errors over a three game stretch.
In the first matchup, UVU started well as senior Kody Hall and senior Ryan Eastburn started off with back to back singles. They went on to score the first two runs of the game, making it 2-0 after the first inning. Going into the fifth inning UVU was leading 3-1, however, GCU was able to add one in the fifth and two in the sixth to take a lead of 4-3. The Lopes were able to add some insurance runs in the eighth and ninth inning to win the game 9-4.
On Saturday the UVU offense showed up — hitting three home runs. Two came off the bat of sophomore Pacen Hayes and one from junior Alexander Marco. Unfortunately, the Wolverine defense struggled committing a season high six errors. “I didn’t like our effort from the start,” said UVU head coach Eric Madsen.
GCU started fast jumping out to a 3-0 lead after the first inning. Wolverine junior Paxton Schultz was able to settle in after that not allowing a run until the fifth when the Lopes were able to add another three runs making the score 6-0. UVU was able to cut into the lead in the bottom of the inning with a solo homerun from Hayes.
The sixth inning is when the game got away from UVU as the Lopes scored four runs to make the score 10-1. In the bottom of the seventh inning freshman Mick Madsen was able to single with Hayes coming up to bat. Hayes hit a two-run homer over the left center fence to cut into the Lopes lead of 10-3. However, UVU was not able make the game any closer, losing 11-4.
“I didn’t think we gave a very good effort. It seemed like we weren’t prepared early on, we gave up three runs on errors. It’s not good for our pitchers especially our starter,” said Madsen. “I would like to see us decide we want to win.”
In the final game of the series, it did not go how Madsen would have liked. UVU once again had trouble in the field, committing four errors and losing 14-4. The Wolverines battled hard through eight innings, where the score was tied at 4-4. However, GCU took over in the ninth inning, where they had nine straight batters reach base and scored 10 runs to put the game away.
With the three-game sweep UVU’s record falls to 5-22 and 2-4 in conference play. The team now heads to Northern Colorado to start a three-game conference series next weekend.
