Baseball hopes to keep up offensive spark against UC Irvine

In front of its home crowd last Tuesday, UCLA baseball offered up a lethargic performance, getting blown out against a sub-.500 Long Beach State team. The Bruins’ offense continued to wallow in its ineffectiveness and their usually stout pitching got rocked.

Just days later, however, No. 9 UCLA was a completely different team in its weekend series at Washington State, as the offense drove up the electricity bill at Bailey-Brayton Field by lighting up the scoreboard so much. Now, the Bruins return home to face the UC Irvine Anteaters (28-12) tonight in a rematch of a game that went to extra innings two weeks ago, hoping that they can bottle up that weekend jolt of offense and continue to carry it with them.

“We just swung the bats with more aggressiveness. Guys saw the ball well this weekend and hopefully this will get us going,” said coach John Savage.

It was clear that the offense started clicking, but the Bruins claim they didn’t make any special adjustments to their batting strategy.

“I think we continued to stick to our plan and our approach and finally some balls dropped for us. I don’t think we necessarily changed anything too much, but the offense has definitely turned around for us,” said junior outfielder Brian Carroll.

While the approach didn’t change drastically, the results did. The Bruins put 20 runs on the board during the series, pushing any thoughts of last Tuesday’s blowout loss from their mind.

“We knew we needed to turn things around after Tuesday and we came out on Friday and we played well and we played well on Saturday. Unfortunately we couldn’t finish it (Sunday),” Carroll said.

But despite Sunday’s 4-3 loss, UCLA is riding a wave of momentum and confidence into today’s matchup, with its bats hotter than they’ve been all year.

“When you’re swinging the bats it’s contagious, and sometimes when you’re not it’s contagious, so we just got to make the most of our opportunity coming up against Irvine and Utah,” Savage said.

With things clicking for the Bruins (27-13, 11-7 Pac-12), they are continuing to focus on their own play rather than worry about their opponents.

“I don’t think many guys are thinking about who we’re playing. We’re kind of focused on Monday’s practice and getting over this loss and we’ll think about Irvine on Tuesday,” said junior shortstop Pat Valaika after UCLA’s loss on Sunday.

But while the players aren’t concerned about their opponent, Savage knows the significance of tonight’s game.

“Well, they’re in the same boat we are. We’re 27-13, they’re 28-12. They’re battling for a playoff spot and every in is so critical right now in regards to RPI, so it’s a big game for both of us,” Savage said.

“They’re going to be very competitive and they’re as well- coached as anyone in the country so we expect a competitive game.”