Fueled by sound pitching, New Mexico was able to even the series against San Jose State on Saturday afternoon, taking game two 6-2.
The Lobos fell in a heartbreaker 9-8 in the opening game, despite tying the game up twice in the late stages of Friday night’s ballgame.
Sophomore right-hander Tyler Stevens (5-2) took to the hill on Saturday, and kept the Spartans’ bats at bay and freshman Christian Tripp finished the day with a sound outing, picking up his first career save.
New Mexico got after it early, picking up two runs in the opening frame of the game, and wouldn’t let go of the lead for the remainder of the contest.
Lobo first baseman Jack Zoellner started the Lobo scoring with a two-RBI single out of the five-spot, plating Luis Gonzalez and Jared Holley with two outs in the top of the first inning.
After a scoreless second inning, Austin Bell came through, grounding into a fielder’s choice in the third inning to give UNM an early 3-0 advantage.
The Spartans would proceed to score a run on an Aaron Pleschner RBI single in the bottom half of the inning. It was the only run SJSU (11-23, 4-13 MW) would plate against Stevens in his 7.2 innings of work.
UNM followed suit in the top of the fourth when Carl Stajduhar flied out to centerfield, deep enough to score Holley for the second time on Saturday.
Freshman shortstop Dalton Bowers joined in with some RBI fun of his own with a triple in the fifth to score catcher Scottie Graham. Jared Mang ended UNM’s run-scoring after his sacrifice fly plated Holley for the third time in game two.
Though Stevens was cruising along, head coach Ray Birmingham decided to move to the bullpen as the righty’s pitch count climbed to 108.
Tripp ran into a bit of trouble in the bottom of the eighth inning, but worked out of it only allowing one run in his 1.1 innings of work.
“That was a great job by our pitching staff,” Birmingham said in a release. “Tyler kept the ball down and Tripp is getting better with each outing. He’s getting pretty good for us.”
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The Lobos (25-11, 13-4 MW) will seek to take the series in today’s rubber match, beginning at 12 p.m. MT. UNM has yet to lose a conference series, and will look to continue that trend behind Sunday starter Colton Thomson (4-1).
Liam Cary-Eaves is the sports editor for the Daily Lobo. He primarily covers volleyball, women’s basketball and baseball. He can be reached at sports@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @Liam_CE.
