Lopes cruise to Friday night win

Friday, May 4

Bakersfield, Calif.

6 p.m.

Grand Canyon

26-19, 0

CSU Bakersfield

16-28, 0

Grand Canyon

CSU Bakersfield

5/4/2018 10:00:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score Photo Gallery

Evans posts five RBIs

By: Josh Hauser

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - Grand Canyon posted 13 runs in a series opener for the second consecutive week, cruising past CSU Bakersfield 13-4 at Hardt Field on Friday night.

GCU scored nine times in the first three innings to break the game open early.

"I thought our at bats early in the game -- we put pressure on them and we did a really nice job of staying up the middle," head coach Andy Stankiewicz said. "That's where we've got to make our living. We're not a power-hitting team. We're a team that's got to commit to line drives, and I thought we did a really good job of that early in the game."

The offense came fast and furious for GCU. Five pitches into the game, Quin Cotton had tripled and Pikai Winchester drove him in on a sacrifice fly to give the Lopes a 1-0 lead. Tyler Wyatt hit GCU's second sac fly of the frame to put the Lopes up 2-0.

CSUB worked itself into trouble in the second by loading up the bases on an error and back-to-back wild pitches. Ian Evans took full advantage of the Roadrunners' mishaps, hitting a ball to the right-center field wall and clearing the bases on a double to put GCU in front 5-0.

"That's Ian, that's what he does," Stankiewicz said. "He's not trying to do too much. That was a perfect illustration of that, put us way out in front."

The errors continued to mount for CSU Bakersfield in the third, and the Lopes kept taking advantage. GCU scored three times on one hit and two CSUB errors.

GCU kept its streak of scoring in every inning alive with single tallies in the fourth and fifth. Marc Mumper doubled in the Lopes' 10th run before a leadoff single by Cotton set up an RBI groundout for Evans to put GCU up 11-0.

The Roadrunners averted the mercy rule by scoring two in the sixth and two in the seventh. GCU limited the damage and held on for the 13-4 win.

Evans picked up his fifth RBI on a single up the middle in the seventh, and a pinch-hitting Brock Burton hit a sac fly in the eighth. Evans had the most RBIs in a game by a GCU player this season.

After retiring the first six he faced, Jake Wong was asked to handle long lay-offs between innings thanks to GCU's offense putting up crooked numbers. CSUB loaded the bases with no outs in the third inning, but Wong worked out of the frame without allowing a run, partially thanks to his own defensive work -- gloving a line out and throwing to second base for a double play.

Wong ended the night with 6.1 innings of work, allowing the four late runs. Run support was on the right-hander's side, improving Wong's record on the year to 8-1. Wong has won the most games in a single season for a GCU pitcher since Jake Repavich was an eight-game winner as a freshman in 2015.

Jeramy Smith and Nick Hull combined to throw 2.2 scoreless innings out of the bullpen.

Five batters had multi-hit games led by Cotton's three. Checking in with two-hit efforts were Winchester, Evans, Wyatt and Preston Pavlica.

Cotton was just one hit shy of the cycle for the third time in the last four games. The sophomore was missing a single on April 27, a triple on April 29, and a home run on Friday night.

With a series-opening win in hand, the Lopes will look to buck the trend of losing Game 2. GCU has won the opener but been forced to play a rubber match the past three weekends.

"We've got to be ready to go. We haven't been as good on Day 2," Stankiewicz said. "It's right in front of us. Tomorrow we have to come out with great energy, be relentless, and take the energy from a win tonight."

First pitch is set for 6 p.m. with LHP Jake Repavich (2-4, 7.35) set to face CSU Bakersfield's RHP Naithen Dewsnap (2-5, 4.03).