'Lopes Drop Second Game at Irvine

Saturday, March 22

Irvine, CA

1 p.m.

Grand Canyon

10-11

UC Irvine

15-7

Grand Canyon

UC Irvine

Andrew Naderer matched his season-high with 6 strikeouts

Photo by: Theon Carrier

3/22/2014 3:23:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

Series finale slated for tomorrow at 1 p.m.

The Grand Canyon University baseball team (10-11, 2-1 WAC) fell 4-0 to UC Irvine (15-7, 0-0 BWC) today in the second game of their series at Anteater Ballpark in Irvine, Calif. The Antelopes were shutout for the second game in a row despite finding themselves with scoring opportunities in three different innings.

"We are kind of getting schooled here in the art of baseball," said head coach Andy Stankiewicz. "It's a matter of not making adjustments at the plate. We came out today and made an error on the very first play of the game, and that can't happen. That's not who we are."

"These first two games, we just simply haven't done enough," Stankiewicz said. "Hopefully our guys will learn from this and how to compete in an environment like this."

Click here for Michael Potter's postgame interview with assistant coach Gregg Wallis.

Starter Andrew Naderer (3-3) was tagged with the loss after allowing three runs (one earned) on six hits with no walks and a season-high-tying six strikeouts over 7.0 innings of work. It marked Naderer's fourth start with at least 7.0 innings pitched and three or fewer runs allowed.

David Walker went 2-for-4 at the plate, while Josh Meyer and Chad De La Guerra each had one hit.

Walker opened the game with a single up the middle and made his way over to third two outs later, but UCI starter Elliot Surrey ended the frame with a fly out to centerfield. The Anteaters threatened in the bottom half of the first by putting their leadoff runner on via a two-base error, who came around to score on a one-out triple to right-centerfield. UCI tacked on another run to stake an early 2-0 lead before the first inning was over.

Neither team had a runner on base again until Brandon Smith was hit by a pitch with one out in the fifth inning. Smith tried to score on a double off the bat of Meyer, but was called out at home on the play.

UCI collected three straight singles to begin the bottom half of the fifth and had the bases loaded with one out, but were able to get just one run across as Naderer induced a strikeout and popup to get out of the inning.

The 'Lopes had De La Guerra and Walker on first and third with two outs in the sixth, but Surrey struckout pinch-hitter Brian Kraft to keep GCU off the board.

The Anteaters added a run in the eighth inning on a one-out RBI double down the left field line.

"The frustrating part is that you get an opportunity to come to Southern California and show some people what you've got, and we really haven't done that," added Stankiewicz. "Thankfully, we get another opportunity tomorrow. We need to bring better focus and fight, and see if we can't give them a run for their money."

The series concludes tomorrow with first pitch slated for 1 p.m. Tune in to Independent Talk 1100 AM KFNX (online at www.1100kfnx.com or via the TuneIn Radio app on any smartphone) at 12:50 for the pregame show with Michael Potter.

UCI 4, GCU 0