By Scott Bair
Daily Bruin Reporter
The UCLA Bruins played well enough to win all three games
against Cal State Northridge this weekend. They out-hit the
Matadors by a count of 37-34. They had three more stolen bases and
seven fewer errors. The two teams actually had the same number of
runs scored. The Bruins beat or tied CSUN in every statistical
category expect one ““ wins and losses.
UCLA (12-12) lost that category 2-1. The offense and defense
played well enough to win all three games, but the Bruin bullpen
gave two victories away. The Bruins lost the first two games of the
weekend series 10-9 and 12-11, extending their record in one-run
games to 1-5 before winning Sunday’s finale 6-3.
“We beat a good team twice and that’s always a good
sign,” CSUN head coach Mike Botesole said.
Botesole’s team won those two games with a little help
from the Bruin bullpen.
UCLA was ahead of the Matadors 6-4 after five solid innings from
freshman starter Wes Whisler. Brandon Averill registered one
scoreless inning in the six before walking the bases loaded. With
two strikes and two outs, pinch hitter Ryan Haag hit a two RBI
ground rule to eliminate the Bruin lead. CSUN (16-7) took the lead
on a three-run home run by outfielder Adam Nikolic.
Down by four runs with three outs to go, the Bruin offense tried
to negate the bullpen’s mistakes with a three-run home run by
left fielder Adam Berry. It still was not enough to surmount the
bullpen’s performance.
“It’s really frustrating,” right-fielder Ben
Francisco said after Friday’s game. “We deserved to win
this game today.”
“The bullpen is struggling,” he said. “We got
to find some guys to step up in our bullpen because they’re
not getting it done right now. We have confidence that
they’ll come back and play better tomorrow.”
The bullpen did not play better. If it’s possible, they
actually played worse. Bruin starter Chris Cordeiro and reliever
David Johnson gave up 10 runs in the first five innings.
The Bruins began another comeback when Berry hit his second home
run of the day and eighth in his last seven games to make the score
10-4. The Bruins were rolling and the momentum had clearly shifted
from the Matador hitters to the Bruin bats.
The score was 10-7 in the top of the eighth when Ben Francisco
stepped to the plate. With the weight of another pitching disaster
on his shoulders, Francisco lifted the Bruins’ spirits when
he hit a three-run home run over the center field wall to take an
11-10 lead into the final two innings.
The Bruins held a one-run advantage in the ninth. With closer
Billy Sudsdorf warming up in the bullpen, Bruin coaches left Kunes,
a fly ball pitcher, on the mound in the ninth. Unfortunately for
UCLA, Matador Field was more like an aircraft carrier than a
baseball diamond with the quantity of balls that were taking off.
CSUN’s Aaron McKenzie and Rudy Simpson hit back-to-back home
runs off of Kunes to take away yet another Bruin victory.
“With the way that we played today, we win the game nine
out of ten times,” UCLA head coach Gary Adams said. “I
though we had the right guy on the mound in that situation. They
just hit home runs at the right time.”
Casey Janssen led the Bruins in Sunday’s 6-3 victory,
which the bullpen didn’t negate. UCLA reliever Kevin Jerkins
pitched well in the win and gave the Bruins a little confidence in
their shattered bullpen.