Anteater right-hander Ryan Kysar delivered home with a runner on first in a scoreless ballgame.

Waiting at the plate was the Bruins’ Mulivai Levu who belted Kysar’s belt-high 2-0 fastball over the left field wall to put his team in front 2-0 in the bottom of the first.

With its sophomore first baseman giving it an early lead it wouldn’t relinquish, UCLA baseball (13-4, 2-1 Big Ten) defeated UC Irvine (11-5, 2-1 Big West) by a score of 11-4 at Jackie Robinson Stadium on Tuesday. With the victory, the Bruins improved to 5-0 this season when scoring first and snapped their seven-game skid against the Anteaters.

“Everyone just had a good approach at the plate,” Levu said. “We needed runners on base to get into scoring position and for the right guys to come up.”

With runners on the corners and just one away, Kysar’s 22nd pitch of the frame was yet another 2-0 fastball – this one right down Broadway to Payton Brennan.

The redshirt sophomore center fielder tattooed Kysar’s offering over the wall in left center – putting UCLA up five before the veteran hurler could get through the first inning.

“When left-handers are hitting the ball out of the ballpark here at night, it’s impressive,” coach John Savage said. “Those two home runs, you don’t see that often at night. That’s just really good hitting.”

Meanwhile, seven Bruin pitchers combined to hold the Anteaters to seven hits and punched out 11. And though the staff dealt seven free passes and plunked four, they stranded 13 on the basepaths.

“They’re an on-base team,” Savage said. “They do an incredible job with walks and hit by pitches, that’s their game. If they came up with a big hit, then they would have been right back in the game.”

UCLA was also an on-base team against UCI, reaching safely 25 times. When the Bruins rallied for four in the fifth, six batters reached with two outs – one on a hit-by-pitch, two on singles and three on walks.

“We have a lot of really good young baseball players that know what they’re doing,” Savage said. “They know the strike zone, they know they can use the whole field when they hit. They’re on base and they’re doing damage. It’s just a good formula.”

Freshman right-hander Wylan Moss made the start Tuesday – allowing just two hits across 2.2 shutout frames – before redshirt junior southpaw Ian May came in for his first Bruin relief appearance.

May went 2.1 innings without allowing a hit, but was pulled after plunking the leadoff man in the sixth. Savage would need to employ five additional arms to get through the remainder of the contest.

While UCI scored three in the sixth, redshirt junior right-hander Josh Alger and sophomore right-hander Luke Rodriguez – who have a combined 1.88 ERA across 24 innings this season – managed to stop the bleeding, combining for 2.1 scoreless innings.

“Knowing coach Savage, he’ll put our best guys out there no matter what the score is,” said sophomore right-hander Justin Lee, who pitched the ninth. “It’s definitely more comfortable being out there with the big lead, but it’s just like every other outing.”