UCLA baseball posts season-high hits, runs in staggering win against USC

UCLA allowed a season-high number of first-inning runs in its loss Saturday.

But facing their crosstown rivals just a day later, it was the Bruins who put up runs early and kept piling it on late into the game.

After picking up its second loss of the season to TCU in its second game of the Southern California College Baseball Classic, No. 6 UCLA (13-2) scored three runs in the top of the first inning against USC (9-5), going on to defeat the Trojans 15-3 and deny its crosstown rivals an undefeated run over the weekend.

Junior center fielder Garrett Mitchell led off the Bruins with a single to right-center field to get UCLA started for the afternoon. The ensuing batter, freshman right fielder Michael Curialle, reached on an error by Trojan pitcher Alex Cornwell – the first of two Trojan errors in the opening frame.

Cornwell was able to bounce back, however, putting the next two batters away. But with two outs, the Bruins rallied with back-to-back hits by junior left fielder Pat Caulfield and sophomore third baseman Jake Moberg. After the top half of the opening inning, the Bruins had a three-run lead before a Trojan had entered the batter’s box.

The three-run lead was slashed to one in the bottom of the inning as sophomore right-hander Jesse Bergin gave up a walk to the leadoff Trojan batter, who was eventually brought home by Trojan catcher/infielder Clay Owens who went deep to dead center to put runs on the board for his home squad.

Bergin bounced back, however, sending the Trojans down in order in the second inning. Bergin would go on to pitch six full innings, allowing just three hits to notch his fourth win in as many starts.

The Bruins scored their fourth run in the third inning on a sacrifice fly from senior designated hitter Kyle Cuellar, and Cornwell was forced to exit two innings later as his pitch count crept up to 100 on the day.

Despite the new arm on the mound in the fifth, Cuellar wasn’t done on offense just yet. In his next plate appearance, Cuellar drove an inside fastball over the right field wall to bring in two runs on his first home run of the year. The deep ball came immediately after Caulfield laid down a sacrifice bunt to score redshirt freshman first baseman JT Schwartz from third.

After Bergin needed just eight pitches to retire the side in the bottom of the sixth inning, UCLA headed into the seventh with the lead standing at six runs.

The Bruins didn’t stop piling on the runs in the late innings, as UCLA pushed the lead to 10-2 in the top of the seventh inning off another Trojan error – one of the five total errors for USC in the game.

The very next batter, sophomore second baseman Mikey Perez, hit another ball down the third base line to score an additional two runs to push the lead to 10 and chase the fourth Trojan pitcher to enter the game.

After Bergin’s day came to a close, junior right-hander Michael Townsend made his 10th appearance of the season, allowing one run in the bottom of the seventh inning. And after UCLA added an additional two runs the next inning, two more relief pitchers – senior Kyle Mora and junior Holden Powell – entered the game to close it out.

Over the nine innings, UCLA tallied team highs in hits and runs to win by its largest margin of the season.

Without a midweek game scheduled, UCLA will take the field again to begin conference play against Oregon at Jackie Robinson Stadium on Friday.