Owls split weekend with Bears
After an encouraging weekend at the Houston College Classic and a dominating 8-1 win against rival Sam Houston State last week, the baseball team went back to its inconsistent ways in the first two games of a four-game series against the University of California-Berkeley Golden Bears last weekend. In the opener last Thursday night, Rice ace Taylor Wall struggled against the Cal (9-5) offense, allowing a pair of three-run home runs to put the Owls (11-7) in a 6-0 hole. The Rice bats, silent for the first six innings, rallied late to trim the deficit to two, but a line drive off the bat of junior right fielder Chad Mozingo was caught and resulted in a game-ending double play with a final score of 8-6.
The second game of the weekend was the same story, as starter Jared Rogers worked only 3 1/3 innings, allowing four runs, and the Owls fell just short of the comeback, losing 6-4.
On Saturday afternoon the series took an unexpected turn. By the end of the third inning, the Owls were behind 7-2 as starter Tony Cingrani was unable to work out of a jam. The Rice bats were again held in check for the first half of the ballgame.
But in the bottom of the sixth inning, the Rice bats erupted for 12 runs. With 17 men coming to the plate in the inning for the Owls, Rice batters combined for eight hits and took advantage of a pair of errors in the field.
In the middle of the rally were senior first baseman Jimmy Comerota and junior shortstop Rick Hague, two team leaders who had been struggling at the plate with their respective .255 and .279 batting averages. This inning, that would all change.
Comerota's triple spurred the rally in which the next five batters would reach base, including a double by Hague that brought in two runs. Without the benefit of a single home run in the inning, Rice poured on the offensive attack and relieved a series of frustrations at the plate.
"In an inning like that, all our frustration was at the peak, and then that inning just let us breathe in the dugout," Hague said. "Everyone was uptight and we were going up and swinging at bad pitches; everyone could feel it and it was really contagious.
"But once we broke it open, it was like everyone took a big sigh of relief."
Hague himself reached base seven times in the game, breaking out of an early-season slump.
With a 14-7 lead, the Owls were far from done producing runs on the afternoon. Rice scored another six runs the next inning, capped off by a three-run home run by sophomore third baseman Anthony Rendon, and added another half dozen in the eighth for a total 26 runs on the day.
Rendon's grand slam in the eighth gave him two home runs and eight RBIs that day, and Rice cruised to an eye-opening 26-11 win. Those 26 runs were enough for the sixth-most scored by the Owls in a game.
The momentum of the previous day's offensive outburst carried over to Sunday afternoon, as the Owls won the game 7-4 to earn the series split. The two teams exchanged the lead a number of times in the first six innings, with the game tied 4-4 headed into the bottom of the seventh.
Junior righthander Boogie Anagnostou provided a solid outing, working into the seventh inning while giving up four runs on the afternoon.
With the Owls at the plate and the game tied, Mozingo and junior left fielder Michael Fuda led things off with back-to-back singles. After a walk to Hague, a wild pitch with the bases loaded brought in a run and gave Rice the lead. Rendon was then intentionally walked, followed with a sacrifice fly by sophomore Jeremy Rathjen to give Rice a 6-4 lead.
The second wild pitch of the inning gave Rice the 7-4 advantage before the inning came to a close. Senior righthander Mark Haynes (2-0) pitched two scoreless innings, earning the save and salvaging a split of the weekend series.
Following the game on Sunday afternoon, Head Coach Wayne Graham had some good things to say about his team's effort.
"I thought it was an unusually good game from the standpoint of execution," Graham said. "It shows you what you can do if you play the game right. A team played us tough today, and we did fine."
The team continued its success on Tuesday evening against in-state rival University of Texas. The No. 3 Longhorns (13-4) won the two teams' first meeting in the Houston College Classic 2-1.
With Texas ahead 3-2 in the third, senior center fielder Steven Sultzbaugh hit a three-run home run to put the Owls ahead 5-3. After Texas scored another run in the fourth, Rendon answered with his team-leading seventh home run of the season to post a 6-4 lead.
The eighth brought Rice more runs, with a bunt by Hague scoring Comerota from third and another single by sophomore catcher Craig Manuel upping the score to 8-5. The Owls added two more runs, and Texas added another, for a final count of 10-6 Owls.
Freshman reliever Tyler Duffey (2-0) tossed 2 2/3 innings for the Owls, while freshman Holt McNair (1-0) earned his first win.
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