MESA, Ariz. – Utah Valley University senior
Jake Carr gave up just two runs over seven innings en route to leading the Wolverines to a 4-2 WAC Tournament opening-round victory over Sacramento State on Wednesday evening at Hohokam Stadium in Mesa.
With the win, the sixth-seeded Wolverines (15-39) move on to face the top-seeded New Mexico State Aggies on Thursday night while the third-seeded Hornets (33-23) will drop to an elimination game against CSU Bakersfield on Thursday morning.
"I'm really happy for the team. The guys truly deserved this win and came through in the clutch when we needed it tonight," head UVU coach
Eric Madsen said. "Jake did a great job for us. He was cramping up late in the game but battled and found a way to get through it. Jesse (Schmit) then came on and was confident which was great to see."
The senior Carr gave up just two runs on four hits while striking out six over 7.0 impressive innings of work to earn his fifth win of the season. Closer
Jesse Schmit then came on to earn his fifth save of the year after pitching a pair of scoreless innings en route to helping the Wolverines record the opening-round victory.
Scoreless in the second, the Hornets were the first to get things going by driving in a pair of second-inning runs to jump out to a 2-0 lead. After a pair of walks, Sac State picked up the first run on an RBI single to left from Martin Vincelli-Simard to make it 1-0. The Hornets then picked up their second run of the inning on a sacrifice fly from Bronson Grubbs, but the Wolverine defense responded on the play to cut down the trail runner trying to take third to turn an inning-ending double play and limit Sac State to just two runs in the inning.
UVU then responded in the top of the third with three runs of its own to take a 3-2 lead. Following a double from
Michael Beltran and back-to-back one-out walks from
Ryan Eastburn and
Alexander Marco, freshman
Mick Madsen delivered a two-run double to left center to tie the game at 2-2. Later in the frame with two away,
Paul Estrada worked a bases loaded walk to bring home Marco and give the Wolverines a 3-2 lead.
Utah Valley starter Carr then settled in from there, as he retired 10 consecutive Sac State batters to keep it a 3-2 contest. The Wolverine senior struck out three during the stretch and later managed to escape a sixth-inning jam with his fifth strikeout of the contest to help maintain the one-run advantage for UVU.
In the top of the ninth, UVU then got a leadoff single from the WAC's active hits leader
Trevor Howell and he later came around to score on a one-out RBI single to center from Marco to extend Utah Valley's advantage to 4-2.
Sac State then got a one-out walk in the last of the ninth from Dylan McPhillips to bring the tying runner to the plate, but Schmit responded by striking out Vincelli-Simard and drawing a groundout off the bat of Trevor Doyle to end the ballgame.
As a staff, UVU limited Sac State's offense to just four hits on the day.
The senior Eastburn led UVU at the plate by going a perfect 2-for-2 with a pair of walks and a run scored while the senior Howell followed by going 2-for-5 with a run scored. Madsen too had a strong outing for the Wolverines by going 1-fo-4 with a two-run double. Vincelli-Simard led Sac State by going 1-for-3 with an RBI.
The contest marked UVU's first WAC Tournament game since 2017, as the team failed to qualify for the conference tournament a season ago.
The Wolverines will now advance on to face the defending WAC Tournament champion and top-seeded NM State Aggies on Thursday night at 8 p.m. MDT (in Utah)/7 p.m. MST (in Ariz.). The winner will then move on to Friday's semifinal game while the loser will head to an elimination game.
"We beat a great team tonight in Sac State and we face another great team on Thursday in New Mexico State," Madsen added. "We just need to come out and be ready to go tomorrow night."
