May 1, 2010
OREM, Utah - Utah Valley baseball set a new school-record with its 10th consecutive win in a doubleheader sweep of Texas-Pan American, 7-2 and 8-7, on Saturday at Brent Brown Ballpark.
Chris Benson homered twice and drove in five runs and Zane Gray tossed a complete game in the seven-inning win in the opener. In the second game, Brian Whatcott got his sixth save as the Wolverines (24-14, 14-1) held off a late charge by the Broncs (14-25, 3-10).
"We have high expectations for our club and our players have really made a big commitment to improve and stay focused on winning the next game," said UVU head coach Eric Madsen about the win streak. "We've brought good energy to the park and our guys have been focused and we've gotten after it and played hard. Texas-Pan American is a good team. We've had to scratch-and-claw to get anything."
Trailing 2-0 in the third, Benson followed singles by Jake Rickenbach and Jace Brinkerhoff with a three-run shot to left-center. That's all the Wolverines would need as Gray kept UTPA off the scoreboard over the final four innings.
In the fourth, Cole McWhorter singled home Kevin Arendse before a three-run fifth capped the scoring. Brinkerhoff singled to lead off the fifth and Benson hit his ninth home run two batters later, a two-run shot that ties him for the team lead with Brinkerhoff and Goose Kallunki.
UVU added another run with two outs when Arendse doubled for the fourth time in the series and then scored on an Austin Heaps double.
Arendse finished the game 2-for-2 and had hits in six straight at-bats to start the series. He also reached base in eight straight plate appearances.
Gray allowed two runs on eight hits and struck out three without a walk to move to 4-5 on the year. Cody Plunk dropped to 3-3 after five complete innings and seven runs on 10 hits with three strikeouts and a pair of walks.
Stuart MacInnes scored both runs for Texas-Pan American. After leading off the game with a double, he scored on an RBI single by Angel Ibanez. MacInnes homered in the third for the Broncs' second run.
In game two, UTPA again took an early lead when Abraham Garcia doubled to score Ibanez all the way from first.
UTPA starter Leo Chang kept the Wolverines out of the hit column on his first trip thru the lineup but UVU got to him with five runs in the third to take a 5-1 lead.
With one out in the third, Utah Valley racked up five consecutive hits; Rickenbach doubled, Jason Zundel singled and Brinkerhoff doubled to plate UVU's first run. Billy Burgess then singled up the middle to score Zundel and Brinkerhoff to make it 3-1.
Two batters later Kallunki doubled home Burgess and then scored on a base hit to left by Arendse to complete the inning. Arendse is 8-for-10 in the series with four doubles and is 14-for-19 with seven doubles and a home run over the last five games.
The Broncs got single runs in the fourth and fifth to make it 5-3 when Arendse delivered another two-out base hit in the fifth to score Burgess, extending the lead back to three.
In the sixth, Brinkerhoff blooped a single into right to score McWhorter and Zundel to give the Wolverines an 8-3 edge before UTPA made its late run.
Ibanez' RBI double in the top of the seventh scored Billy Donaho and two batters later Vincent Mejia homered to left and made it an 8-6 game.
In the eighth, UTPA loaded the bases with two outs before Whatcott came in with a two-run lead. Garcia drew a walk to force a run in before the UVU cloaer got Mejia to foul out to Kallunki at first. Whatcott then retired the side in order in the ninth to record the four-out save.
Justin Campbell improved to 3-0 after 6.2 innings in which he allowed six runs on 11 hits. Chang dropped to 0-4 after surrendering eight runs on nine hits in 5.1 innings.
Burgess had three hits and drove in two runs while Brinkerhoff drove in three and had two hits. Arendse also had two hits and two RBI.
The series finale is scheduled for Sunday morning at 9 a.m. Utah Valley also hosts BYU next Tuesday at 6 p.m. before hitting the road for a key conference series at New York Tech.
