Baseball: ‘Eaters beat Riverside in must-win situation

Richard Dunn

ANTEATER BALLPARK - Baseball lingo can be a little dramatic, but in

the case of UC Irvine, catcher Chris Miller hit the hammer on the nail in

summing up his team’s future.

“Our lives are on the line, you’ve got to say,” Miller said, after

host UCI defeated UC Riverside, 8-3, Friday night in a Big West

Conference game as the Anteaters kept their postseason hopes alive.

“Now, we’ve got to win the next two (today and Sunday against

Riverside),” added Miller, a key offensive contributor for the Anteaters

(32-25, 13-9 in the Big West) in all three innings they scored, including

ripping his 11th home run of the season in the third, a school

single-season record.

Miller, who broke Bryant Winslow’s 1991 record of 10 home runs, broke

the game open in the fourth with a two-run single as Irvine built an 8-3

lead.

UC Riverside (29-27, 9-13) scored three runs in the first inning

against UCI starter Brett Smith, but the hard-throwing freshman

right-hander settled down and retired 21 of the next 24 batters, yielding

only one hit after the first inning.

“I tend to have my better days when I don’t have anything in the first

inning,” said Smith, who improved to 5-2 and struck out seven in seven

innings after a 113-pitch outing.

UCI, which plays Riverside tonight at 6 p.m. and Sunday in the

regular-season finale at 1 p.m., pushed across four runs in the second to

take the lead.

Chris Klemm opened the inning with a double to left, then after a walk

to Miller, R.J. Brown singled Klemm home from third, where he reached on

a wild pitch.

Jaime Martinez sacrificed runners to second and third, then an out

later, B.J. Eucce singled home Miller. Jon Horwitz followed with an RBI

single and, later, Eucce scored from third on an error by Riverside

pitcher A.J. Shappi, whose pickoff attempt was wild.

Smith needed no more support, but Miller launched a 2-2 pitch over the

left-field wall in the third to give UCI a 5-3 edge, then the ‘Eaters

scored three times in the fourth to bust it open.

Horwitz ignited a two-out rally in the fourth with a bloop double to

left, and Gregg Wallis followed with an infield single to chase Shappi.

Riverside countered with left-hander Mike Curcie out of the bullpen to

face UCI’s Matt Anderson and Klemm, both lefties, but Anderson singled up

the middle to plate Horwitz and Klemm walked on four pitches to set up

Miller’s two-run single against new Riverside reliever Jaymes Torres.

“It was a must-win for us with the (Big West) race coming down to the

wire,” UCI Coach John Savage said. “It was definitely a big win for us,

but we need two more wins and it’s going to be a dogfight.”