OREM, Utah – Minnesota took the opener of a three-game series from Utah Valley University, 13-5, on Friday night at Brent Brown Ballpark.

Matt Fiedler was the winning pitcher and also homered and drove in three runs for the Gophers (9-6), who scored six times in the sixth to pull away. Minnesota pounded out 18 hits including five doubles in addition to the Fiedler home run. Utah Valley (9-10) finished with 10 hits on the night.
 
"We didn't do a very good job defensively and then were unable to answer offensively when we needed to," said UVU head coach Eric Madsen. "Minnesota did a great job showing toughness, and I hope our guys learned a lesson from that. That's a good club. We have to play cleaner baseball to give ourselves a chance to win."
 
Both teams scored twice in their first at-bat. Minnesota got a single and a double from the top two hitters in its order before productive outs produced the two runs. Fiedler and Austin Athmann had consecutive RBI groundouts to give Minnesota a 2-0 lead.
 
After Trevor Howell led off the bottom of the first with a walk, the Wolverines (9-10) had three consecutive base hits with Greyson Bogden and Mark Krueger each singling home a run.
 
The Gophers scored a trio of two-out runs in the fourth with Troy Traxler bringing home one with an RBI double and Riley Smith two on a base hit to left.
 
Fiedler's home run came in the fifth before the six-run inning blew the game open. Minnesota sent 11 hitters to the plate in the inning and had four different players drive in runs, including two on a double by Jordan Smith.
 
The Wolverines scored three times in the seventh: Zac Willis had an RBI single, Bogden an RBI double and Stone Ramsey and pinch-hit RBI single.

Fiedler pitched 6.0 innings and gave up two runs on six hits to move to 3-2. Patrick Wolfe (1-1) took the loss after four innings of work and five runs on seven hits.
 
Bogden had two hits and two RBIs for UVU while Howell and Willis also had two hits apiece. Six different Gopher hitters finished with a pair of hits.
 
The series continues on Saturday with a 6 p.m. MT first pitch. Sunday's finale is slated for noon MT.