Madigan hits his grief

LOS ANGELES – What was otherwise a day of celebration for the UC Irvine baseball team Wednesday held a somber undertone for Anteaters right fielder Sean Madigan.

Madigan led Irvine’s 18-1 nonconference victory over Loyola Marymount with a heavy heart.

After Tuesday night’s 6-4 home loss to UCLA, Madigan learned his grandfather, Clinton Whelan, suffered a fatal heart attack earlier that day.

“I know today is supposed to be a happy day,” Madigan said Wednesday, which also happened to be his 20th birthday. “But it’s always hard when you lose a loved one. I’ve gone through it a lot in the last five years. You’ve just got to move on, knowing they’re in a better place. You can’t control what happens.”

The sophomore right fielder wrapped out five hits in six at-bats, including a double and a triple.

He drove in two runs to help the No. 11-ranked UCI (34-15) produce a season high in hits (26) and runs.

The five hits were a career-high for Madigan, a freshman All-American last season who has been battling for playing time after sustaining a fractured L-5 vertebra in fall workouts.

Madigan, a left-handed hitter, earned the start Wednesday after going three for five with three runs batted in in four appearances last week.

Madigan said the news of his grandfather’s death hit him hard Tuesday night and he was thinking of him often Wednesday.

“Whenever you get news like that, it hurts you deep,” said Madigan, who acknowledged he was glad to have baseball to help occupy his thoughts Wednesday. “I know he’ll always be with me. I wrote his name [Grampa] in my hat. I know he loved everything about his grandchildren.”

Madigan, who improved his batting average from .275 to .314 with his watershed performance, said he is clearly in a groove.

“It was all about finding my swing after that injury,” Madigan said. “And these past few weeks, the ball has been looking like a beach ball again. I mean, I don’t know how many hits I’ve gotten in my last few at-bats, but I know I’ve hit the ball pretty hard.”

Madigan had plenty of company in that department as 13 Anteaters had hits, with eight players notching at least two hits against eight pitchers from LMU (22-30).

Brock Bardeen was three for five with three RBIs, while Francis Larson was three for four.

Ben Orloff was two for four with two RBIs, while fellow junior Ollie Linton was two for five with two RBIs.

Tyler Hoechlin, who entered the game in the eighth inning as a pinch-hitter, went two for two with one RBI.

Junior Christian Florido cashed in his first at-bat of the season with a pinch-hit single in the ninth.

UCI had eight consecutive hits in an 11-run eighth inning, sparked by a leadoff home run to right field by sophomore Casey Stevenson, his third of the season.

The Anteaters scored one in the third to tie the game, then posted three in the fourth, and had single tallies in the fifth and seventh.

Starter Matt Dufour earned the win, allowing one hit and one run in three innings, before junior lefty Noel Avison worked four shutout innings, allowing just two hits, to earn his first win as an Anteater. Avison saw his earned-run average improve from 11.37 to 6.97.

Larson, a sophomore catcher, highlighted the defensive effort, throwing out all three runners who tried to steal and also picking another off first base.

“I thought Avison picked us up, Madigan had a huge day and I really liked the way Larson threw behind the plate today,” UCI Coach Mike Gillespie said.

“This was just one of those days,” said Gillespie, who inched closer to his 800th career Division I victory (he is 797-484-2). “Just like the other kind of days are hard to explain, this one is too.”

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Nonconference

UC Irvine 18, Loyola Marymount 1

SCORE BY INNINGS

Dufour, Avison (4), Hathcock (8) , Lopez (9) and Larson; Kenney, Roberts (3), Cho (4), Connolly (8), Eusebio (8), Lowell (8), Williams (8), Burrell (9) and Bernardy . W – Avison, 1-0. L – Roberts, 2-4. 2B – Orloff (UCI), Fisher (UCI), Madigan (UCI), Tavelli (UCI), Donabedian (UCI). 3B – Madigan (UCI), Bardeen (UCI). HR – Stevenson (UCI), Wheeler (LMU).

BARRY FAULKNER may be reached at (714) 966-4615 or barry.faulkner@latimes.com.