UCLA baseball readies for 1st road trip of season in Texas

Three months into its lockout, Major League Baseball will remain dormant for the foreseeable future.

An ongoing labor dispute between the MLB Players Association and team owners caused the league to suspend Opening Day, canceling the first two series of the 2022 season after negotiations bore no fruit this past week.

All will remain quiet at the professional level for the time being.

But in its absence, college baseball is in full swing, and not all big-league parks will be silent for long.

After picking up its first ranked win of the season, UCLA baseball (6-3) will pack its bags for the first time this year and head to Minute Maid Park, the Houston Astros’ home ballpark. UCLA is one of six teams in the Shriners Children’s College Classic, where it will take on Baylor (3-4), Oklahoma (5-2) and No. 1 Texas (9-0) on three consecutive days beginning Friday in the major league stadium.

“It’s a real test,” said coach John Savage. “You’ve got three legitimate teams with three legitimate staffs. It’ll be good for us.”

UCLA is fresh off a shutout win over No. 25 Long Beach State in its midweek game. The freshman duo of right-hander Thatcher Hurd and left-hander Ethan Flanagan held the Dirtbags to two hits in a 3-0 victory Tuesday.

Hurd is part of a Bruin starting rotation that has held opposing lineups scoreless in the past four games. As a team, UCLA has tallied a 2.22 ERA through the first two weeks of the season.

“I think we can carry the same momentum into Houston,” Hurd said.

With the midweek win, UCLA extended its winning streak to four games after sweeping its series against UC Riverside over the weekend.

Freshman infielder Cody Schrier hit two doubles in the Riverside series, but his highlight of the week was a three-run, first-inning home run that rang off his bat and over the wall Tuesday. The blast drove in the Bruins’ only runs against the Dirtbags, but it was enough for the win.

In Texas, however, the Bruins will round out their trip against one of the most storied programs in NCAA baseball. The winner of six College World Series titles, Texas was picked in the D1 preseason rankings as the nation’s top team. The Longhorns have since held on to that position, allowing 10 total runs in nine games and outscoring their opponent by almost seven runs per game.

The Longhorns won 50 games in 2021 and advanced to the College World Series semifinals in Omaha, Nebraska. They returned key members this year from their NCAA tournament run, including right-hander Tristan Stevens and left-hander Pete Hansen.

Texas currently has the No. 1-ranked pitching staff in the nation, sporting a 0.67 ERA while holding opposing bats to a .165 average.

On offense, the Longhorns returned catcher Silas Ardoin, outfielders Douglas Hodo III and Eric Kennedy and a pair of middle infielders in Trey Faltine and Mitchell Daly. Kennedy, Hodo and Ardoin are all batting north of .300, with Kennedy pacing the team at .414.

Before the meeting with Texas, however, UCLA will face Baylor and Oklahoma on Friday and Saturday, respectively.

Baylor will travel to Houston after being swept by Maryland to open the season. Its latest series came against then-No. 23 Duke, in which it took two of three games.

Oklahoma is fresh off a series win over Northwestern State, and it beat Auburn and Michigan in Arlington, Texas, to begin its season.

Faced with the prospect of playing on a major league field against the top-ranked team in the country, Schrier said the weekend’s trip to Texas will be business as usual.

“It’s just baseball,” Schrier said.