USC hits the road to take on UC Irvine
Coming off its first loss of the season to the Long Beach State Dirtbags, USC’s baseball team faced an unusual Southern California weekend of thunderstorms and flooding, which led to a cancelled game on Friday, a postponed game on Saturday and finally a doubleheader on Sunday against the Cal Poly Mustangs.
Work horse · Senior Bob Wheatley, who has spent the second-most time on the mound for the Trojans this season, enters tonight’s game against the Anteaters with an 0.47 ERA. Opponents are hitting .179 against him. – Ralf Cheung | Daily Trojan
Perhaps this unexpected break arrived at an ideal time for the Trojans, considering they ended the weekend on a high note in a 16-0 shutout in game two of the doubleheader. The Trojans turned all 16 of their hits into runs thanks to stellar hitting by the starting lineup, especially senior catcher Jake Hernandez, who went 4-5 at the plate.
Senior starting pitcher Bob Wheatley complemented his teammates’ impressive at-bat efforts by allowing only two hits during his seven innings of work, while striking out a career-high of 10 players.
Wheatley thinks Sunday night’s success will definitely affect the way the Trojans enter tonight’s game against the UC Irvine Anteaters at Anteater Ballpark.
“It’s a confidence boost any time you can put that many runs on the board, especially against a really good team like Cal Poly,” Wheatley said. “The biggest challenge going into tonight’s game will be responding to Sunday’s big win by remembering why and how we won and trying to repeat those actions again to be successful against UCI.”
The Anteaters are led by head coach Mike Gillespie, who was a left-fielder for the Trojans in his college days and was the head coach at USC for 20 years. He led the Trojans to 15 postseason appearances and was named National Coach of the Year by Collegiate Baseball and the American Baseball Coaches Association after leading the Trojans to the national title in 1998.
The Anteaters currently hold an 8-3 overall record and a 5-3 mark at home. UCI will be coming into tonight’s game off of a 5-3 win against Portland last Saturday.
Despite the Anteaters’ early successes this season, USC head coach Dan Hubbs believes the Trojans will be victorious if they keep up their good hitting streak and play “unselfishly.”
“We’re swinging the bat pretty well right now, so we just have to string those at-bats together,” Hubbs said. “We call it playing unselfishly in terms of offense, meaning that the guys need to not try to hit doubles but instead try to hit the ball up the middle and advance runners to give ourselves a chance to win.”
The Trojans will also have to adjust in other ways to prepare for tonight’s game, considering it will be the first time this season they take on the Anteaters at Anteater Ballpark.
“Playing UCI is tough because it’s a big ballpark, so not a lot of balls go out as far, and it’s cold so the ball doesn’t travel as well,” Wheatley said. “Every game I’ve played there has been a low-scoring game because of these challenges, but in my experience, the team that executes the offensive play the best is who’s going to win.”
In terms of pitching, both staffs appear fairly evenly matched, given that the Trojans currently boast a 2.07 ERA compared to the Anteaters’ 1.36.
Despite UCI’s slightly better average in this respect, Hubbs feels that the Trojans actually hold the advantage and are more than capable of handling the Anteater pitching staff.
“We probably have a little bit more arm strength than they do, but they have good pitchers too who can pitch us off balance,” Hubbs said. “I feel confident that whoever’s pitching staff we face, we can match up on the mound.”
In terms of lineup, Hubbs plans on keeping most of the starting players from game two of last Sunday night, with the exception of freshman Jeremy Martinez switching to designated hitter and junior Garrett Stubbs coming in as catcher. Sophomore Brent Wheatley will likely be the starting pitcher.
UCI will be the only away game this week before the Trojans return to Dedeaux Field for the weekend. Hubbs believes that perhaps the team’s strongest asset entering tonight’s game is its increasing confidence in its abilities both offensively and defensively.
“We know that Irvine is playing really well right now and that they are well-coached,” Hubbs said. “We have to play well to beat them. If we play well, we’re gonna have a good chance to win.”