Completed Event: Baseball at Stanford on May 9, 2025 , Win , 4, to, 3
Baseball
at Stanford
W 4-3
Grand Canyon University Athletics
Sunday, May 8
Phoenix, Ariz.
12 p.m.
Grand Canyon
33-16, 19-5
11
vs
10
Sacramento State
24-23, 14-13
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
R
H
E
Sacramento State
0
0
3
2
0
0
2
3
0
10
18
2
Grand Canyon
1
1
0
2
1
1
0
4
1
11
16
3
Photo by: Zach Campbell
GCU mounts stunning rally to take series
5/8/2022 4:42:00 PM | Baseball
Bush homers in 8th to help erase late 4-run deficit; GCU walks off in 9th
In a back-and-forth Sunday afternoon affair that featured five lead changes, it was Grand Canyon left standing with an 11-10 rubber-match win over Sacramento State in walk-off fashion.
In a game that featured 34 combined hits, the most memorable ones came off the bats of sophomore Homer Bush Jr. in the eighth inning and junior Tayler Aguilar in the ninth.
With the Lopes trailing 10-7, Bush smacked a three-run blast to left field to tie the score after GCU had trailed 10-6 just moments earlier. It was Bush's first at bat after entering as a defensive replacement.
"I knew the guy was throwing a lot of splitters and changeups over the plate," Bush said. "I was basically waiting to get something that I could elevate because I had been struggling grounding into double plays and hitting the ball on the ground recently. I wanted to make sure I got the ball in the air at the minimum. Sometimes you get the bat head out and good things happen."
In a 10-10 tie in the bottom of the ninth, Aguilar stepped into the box with the bases loaded and nobody out. He sent a ball to deep center field for the walk-off single that clinched GCU's eighth straight WAC series win.
"I have trust in everyone on this team," Aguilar said. "I knew that somebody was going to get that walkoff. It was either going to be (Elijah) Buries, Juan (Colato), Jacob (Wilson) or me. I knew it was going to be that, because that's how confident we are."
Entering the ninth needing a run to win, Buries and Colato singled to put GCU in favorable position. The Hornets intentionally walked Wilson to get to Aguilar, who ended the game on the third pitch he saw.
"It was a bit of a heart attack for most of us," Bush said of the tight game. "It got me out here feeling like an old man. Games like that, they're always interesting. After the fact, they're fun. During the fact, they're not as fun. It wasn't clean, but any time you can get a win and keep the momentum going for the rest of the year is big."
GCU (33-16, 19-5 WAC) faced deficits of 3-2 in the fourth, 7-6 in the seventh and 10-6 in the eighth but recovered at every turn.
"I feel like the biggest thing with us is we're just focused on our process and ourselves rather than the score and what the other team is doing and stuff like that, which has led to so much success," Bush said. "Whenever we're down in the game, we never really feel down and we never feel like we can't compete with anybody. So that's led to a lot of our success this year."
In a day that Lopes pitching had to deal with plenty of traffic on the bases, there were some critical moments to limit damage.
With the bases loaded in the seventh and the Hornets with two runs already across, senior righty Brodie Cooper-Vassalakis drew a strikeout and an inning-ending ground ball.
After scoring four runs to tie the game in the eighth, GCU's right-hander Blake Reilly faced trouble in the ninth with the bases loaded and one out. But the junior used an infield fly and a fly out to keep the tie intact.
"We knew this series was going to be a tough one coming into it," Aguilar said. "Sac State is our No. 2 competitor in the WAC, and we knew that they're going to come for our necks. We knew that they were competitors, and so are we. We also know that they're not going to back down, so we aren't either."
The top four in GCU's lineup combined for 10 hits and seven RBIs to help keep the Lopes in a high-scoring game.
The Lopes used six pitchers and the Hornets used five to navigate the game. Both teams turned to their closers in the middle of the game to try to slow the scoring. GCU did much of its late-game damage off of Sac State closer Jack Zalasky who was stretched to over three innings of work, surrendering six runs and eight hits.
Both Bush and Aguilar deferred part of Sunday's success to Lopes head coach Andy Stankiewicz.
"We were working on exactly what I did," Bush said of Saturday pregame work with Stankiewicz. "Just trying to get that elevation to the pull side. It's always good when you can practice something and take it into the game."
Aguilar repeated Stankiewicz's mantra of the Lopes only concerning themselves with what they can control.
"It's rubbing off on all of us," Aguilar said. "It's a good thing. I like that we're doing that. I like that we're staying to ourselves. We're just winning games, winning games, winning games. That's all. We do see chatter sometimes but we come together and put that aside us because that's not going to affect us in any way. It's just going to be us on the field that day."
Since losing a three-game series to Sacramento State in 2019, the Lopes have not been beaten in their next 18 conference series including three consecutive series wins over the Hornets.
With six conference games remaining, GCU can wrap up its second straight WAC regular-season title — this year's a divisional title — with two more conference wins.
Before continuing conference action in Las Cruces, New Mexico, the Lopes play their final nonconference game of the regular season when they host Arizona State on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
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In a game that featured 34 combined hits, the most memorable ones came off the bats of sophomore Homer Bush Jr. in the eighth inning and junior Tayler Aguilar in the ninth.
With the Lopes trailing 10-7, Bush smacked a three-run blast to left field to tie the score after GCU had trailed 10-6 just moments earlier. It was Bush's first at bat after entering as a defensive replacement.
"I knew the guy was throwing a lot of splitters and changeups over the plate," Bush said. "I was basically waiting to get something that I could elevate because I had been struggling grounding into double plays and hitting the ball on the ground recently. I wanted to make sure I got the ball in the air at the minimum. Sometimes you get the bat head out and good things happen."
In a 10-10 tie in the bottom of the ninth, Aguilar stepped into the box with the bases loaded and nobody out. He sent a ball to deep center field for the walk-off single that clinched GCU's eighth straight WAC series win.
"I have trust in everyone on this team," Aguilar said. "I knew that somebody was going to get that walkoff. It was either going to be (Elijah) Buries, Juan (Colato), Jacob (Wilson) or me. I knew it was going to be that, because that's how confident we are."
Entering the ninth needing a run to win, Buries and Colato singled to put GCU in favorable position. The Hornets intentionally walked Wilson to get to Aguilar, who ended the game on the third pitch he saw.
"It was a bit of a heart attack for most of us," Bush said of the tight game. "It got me out here feeling like an old man. Games like that, they're always interesting. After the fact, they're fun. During the fact, they're not as fun. It wasn't clean, but any time you can get a win and keep the momentum going for the rest of the year is big."
GCU (33-16, 19-5 WAC) faced deficits of 3-2 in the fourth, 7-6 in the seventh and 10-6 in the eighth but recovered at every turn.
"I feel like the biggest thing with us is we're just focused on our process and ourselves rather than the score and what the other team is doing and stuff like that, which has led to so much success," Bush said. "Whenever we're down in the game, we never really feel down and we never feel like we can't compete with anybody. So that's led to a lot of our success this year."
In a day that Lopes pitching had to deal with plenty of traffic on the bases, there were some critical moments to limit damage.
With the bases loaded in the seventh and the Hornets with two runs already across, senior righty Brodie Cooper-Vassalakis drew a strikeout and an inning-ending ground ball.
After scoring four runs to tie the game in the eighth, GCU's right-hander Blake Reilly faced trouble in the ninth with the bases loaded and one out. But the junior used an infield fly and a fly out to keep the tie intact.
"We knew this series was going to be a tough one coming into it," Aguilar said. "Sac State is our No. 2 competitor in the WAC, and we knew that they're going to come for our necks. We knew that they were competitors, and so are we. We also know that they're not going to back down, so we aren't either."
The top four in GCU's lineup combined for 10 hits and seven RBIs to help keep the Lopes in a high-scoring game.
The Lopes used six pitchers and the Hornets used five to navigate the game. Both teams turned to their closers in the middle of the game to try to slow the scoring. GCU did much of its late-game damage off of Sac State closer Jack Zalasky who was stretched to over three innings of work, surrendering six runs and eight hits.
Both Bush and Aguilar deferred part of Sunday's success to Lopes head coach Andy Stankiewicz.
"We were working on exactly what I did," Bush said of Saturday pregame work with Stankiewicz. "Just trying to get that elevation to the pull side. It's always good when you can practice something and take it into the game."
Aguilar repeated Stankiewicz's mantra of the Lopes only concerning themselves with what they can control.
"It's rubbing off on all of us," Aguilar said. "It's a good thing. I like that we're doing that. I like that we're staying to ourselves. We're just winning games, winning games, winning games. That's all. We do see chatter sometimes but we come together and put that aside us because that's not going to affect us in any way. It's just going to be us on the field that day."
Since losing a three-game series to Sacramento State in 2019, the Lopes have not been beaten in their next 18 conference series including three consecutive series wins over the Hornets.
With six conference games remaining, GCU can wrap up its second straight WAC regular-season title — this year's a divisional title — with two more conference wins.
Before continuing conference action in Las Cruces, New Mexico, the Lopes play their final nonconference game of the regular season when they host Arizona State on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
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Team Stats
Pitching:
W: Reilly, Blake (3-1)
L: Zalasky, Jack (3-4)
Batting:
2B: Heard, Jeffrey 2 ; Bacho, Dawsen 1 ; Vincelli-Simard, M 2 ; Rolling, Josh 1 ; Torres, Keith 2
3B: Doyle, Trevor 1
RBI: Heard, Jeffrey 3 ; Moretto, Steven 2 ; Vincelli-Simard, M 1 ; Rolling, Josh 1 ; Doyle, Trevor 2 ; Gouldsmith, Gunner 1
SH: Doyle, Trevor 1
SF: Moretto, Steven 1 ; Gouldsmith, Gunner 1
Base Running:
RUNS: Heard, Jeffrey 1 ; Bojorquez, Jorge 1 ; Bacho, Dawsen 1 ; Moretto, Steven 1 ; Rolling, Josh 1 ; Doyle, Trevor 2 ; Gouldsmith, Gunner 1 ; Torres, Keith 2
SB: Torres, Keith 1
HBP: Rolling, Josh 1
Batting:
2B: Buries, Elijah 1
3B: Aguilar, Tayler 1
HR: Wilson, Jacob 1 ; Bush Jr., Homer 1
RBI: Buries, Elijah 1 ; Wilson, Jacob 3 ; Aguilar, Tayler 3 ; Bush Jr., Homer 3 ; Weaver, Jonny 1
SF: Weaver, Jonny 1
Base Running:
RUNS: Buries, Elijah 2 ; Colato, Juan 2 ; Wilson, Jacob 2 ; Aguilar, Tayler 1 ; Bush Jr., Homer 1 ; Crenshaw, Dustin 1 ; Buckley, Josh 2
SB: Verdusco, Cade 1
HBP: Colato, Juan 1 ; Aguilar, Tayler 1 ; Buckley, Josh 1
Game Leaders
AB
6
R
2
H
3
RBI
1
AB
5
R
2
H
3
RBI
3
AB
5
R
1
H
3
RBI
3
AB
2
R
2
H
2
RBI
0
Players Mentioned
OF
/ Baseball
OF
/ Baseball
RHP
/ Baseball
RHP
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