‘Eaters sizzling

Barry Faulkner

The UC Irvine baseball team began what, on paper, should be its

feel-good Big West Conference series of the year with an uplifting

15-2 victory over Cal State Northridge Friday at Anteater Ballpark.

The Anteaters (22-17, 5-5 in the Big West) won their third

straight conference game, while extending the Matadors’ Big West

losing streak to 13 this spring.

UCI pounded out 15 hits and benefited from five Northridge errors

to produce its season-high run output.

UCI Coach Dave Serrano used 15 position players in back of

starting Chris Nicoll, who cruised to his fifth win in seven

decisions.

Nicoll struck out 12 in eight innings, one shy of his career high.

He surrendered seven hits, but three of those were bunt singles. He

walked two.

Serrano, while pleased with the victory, was more satisfied about

the level at which his team competed against the struggling Matadors

(14-24-1, 0-13).

“We’ve proved we can beat anyone in the country [including wins

over highly ranked Cal State Fullerton, Long Beach State and

Arizona], but we’ve also proved we can play down to any level of

competition,” Serrano said. “I’ve challenged our kids to not worry

about what color [the opponent] wears or what their record is. Let’s

just worry about ourselves and let’s take care of what we need to

take care of to be successful. The scoreboard will tell the story

from there.”

The story the scoreboard told through 3 1/2 innings was a 2-2

deadlock, but UCI produced four hits and four runs to take command in

the fourth.

Jaime Martinez singled to start the rally and Matt Anderson

followed with a double. Tim Wojcik walked to load the bases and Danny

McCarthy singled in two, his second straight two-run single, to jump

start the UCI rout.

The Anteaters scored three in the fifth and six more in the

seventh, on the strength of balanced production from the starters.

Eight players produced hits for the hosts, while six had at least two

hits.

McCarthy finished 2 for 3 with four RBIs, while Danny Miramontes

went 2 for 5 with three RBIs.

Wojcik, a junior third baseman, was 2 for 3 with two RBIs and

earned praise from Serrano for what the coach called five quality

at-bats.

Serrano also said Nicoll was on his game.

“Not only was his performance pretty dominating, but it’s hard to

pitch in those types of games, because you’re sitting in the dugout

for long innings. It can be tough to keep your focus, but Chris did a

wonderful job.”

Travis Ryhmes pitched a scoreless ninth, fanning two.

Big West Conference

UC Irvine 15,

CS Northridge 2

Score by Innings

*--*

CSUN 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 - 2 7 5

UCI 0 2 0 4 3 0 6 0 x - 15 15 1

*--*

Eberhardt, Lopez (5), Selbly (7) and Fleener; Nicoll, Rhymes (9)

and Wagner. W -- Nicoll, 5-2. L -- Eberhardt, 4-4. 2B -- Meagher

(CSUN), Miramontes (UCI), Martinez (UCI), Anderson (UCI), Wojcik

(UCI). 3B -- Riordan (CSUN).