The Grand Canyon University baseball team continued its early season success Saturday, defeating Cal Poly (1-5), 4-2, Saturday at Baggett Stadium in San Luis Obispo, Calif. The win puts the Antelopes' winning streak at six—one better than last year's season-best.
"It wasn't pretty but the boys scraped one out here tonight," said head coach Andy Stankiewicz. "The best thing of the night was the job Mick Vorhof did coming out of the pen to get some big outs in getting his first save. It was great to see a freshman get up on a big stage like this was tonight and compete and find some success."
With neither team able to produce any runs through the first four innings, GCU used its small-ball approach to push two runs across in the top of the fifth. With runners on first and second,
Josh Meyer dropped a sacrifice bunt to advance both runners 90 feet and
Ben Mauseth followed with a sacrifice fly to plate
Brandon Smith.
Humberto Aranda's RBI double down the left-field line scored
Garrison Schwartz for Canyon's second run.
After the Mustangs answered with two runs of their own in the home half of the fifth, the Lopes tallied their third run of the game in the sixth and added an insurance run in the ninth to secure the 4-2 victory.
Jake Repavich, who has been sharp in all three of his appearances this season, picked up his second-career win on the mound. The first-year left-hander entered in the fifth in relief of starter
Coley Bruns and fanned two in his inning of action. In four and a third, Bruns allowed just two earned runs, while striking out five.
Mick Vorhof recorded the save, tossing three shutout innings to close out the game for the Lopes. He didn't allow a hit and struck out three in his second collegiate appearance.
David Walker paced GCU at the plate, notching a pair of hits in five trips to the dish.
"We need to do a better job of putting the ball in play and can't strike out 13 times like we did tonight," said Stankiewicz. "We need to be more disciplined. However, David Walker had a good game for us at the plate and put together some good ABs. He continues to do well for us in the leadoff spot."
The Lopes will wrap up their three-game set with the Mustangs on Sunday with a 2 p.m. (Arizona Time) matinee. Visit
www.gculopes.com to see how you can follow the action from the series finale.
GCU 4, CP 2