Early miscues, late insurance run sinks Hawai’i against UC Irvine

Too much to overcome.

The University of Hawai’i baseball team dropped the opening game of the Big West Tournament double-elimination bracket on Thursday, falling to top-seeded UC Irvine, 7-5. Left-handed pitcher Ricky Ojeda, the newly minted Big West Pitcher of the Year, picked up the win and moved to 13-0 on the season after going three innings in relief for the Anteaters (40-13) while UH’s Itsuki Takemoto was saddled with the loss.

“You tip your cap to UC Irvine,” UH head coach Rich Hill said to the media following the loss. “They did a great job with matchups and they’re very well coached.”

Hawai’i (34-20) got off to a slow start, finding a near-immediate hole as Takemoto allowed the first three UCI batters to reach and a run to score before finally retiring his first Anteater. In all, three hits, an HBP and a pair of wild pitches from UH’s sophomore starter allowed three runs home through one frame.

Rich Hill went straight to the bullpen after Takemoto opened the second inning with his second hit batter, going to hard-throwing right hander Liam O’Brien. Despite inducing what would have been an inning-ending double play ball, a fielding error by Shunsuke Sakaino allowed the bottom of the second to continue as the Anteaters put up another three-spot and extended the lead to 6-2.

O’Brien recalibrated after his first taste of tournament action to come back and spin two scoreless frames, helping keeping Hawai’i within striking distance before giving way to redshirt freshman Ethan Thomas. Thomas kept the scoreless streak going for the UH bullpen and Ben Zeigler-Namoa gave new life to the fourth seed in the top of the seventh as he crushed a three-run home run off Ojeda to cut the Rainbow Warriors’ deficit down to a single run.

“I love our guys,” Hill said. “I think we out-hit them, and that’s the No. 20 team in the country. Just putting together solid at-bats every inning, it didn’t seem like [UCI] had a 1-2-3 inning all night.”

The Rainbow Warrior rally hit a speed bump in the eighth inning, going down without scoring in the top half of the frame before UCI’s Will Bermudez added an insurance run in the bottom half with an RBI single that just squeaked out of the infield.

Hawai’i brought the tying run to the plate after Matt Miura’s one-out single in the top of the ninth, but UCI closer Max Martin struck out Sakaino and got Zeigler-Namoa to ground out to second base to end the Rainbow Warriors’ comeback try just short.

“There were a lot of really good things tonight,” a spirited Hill stated. “The mistakes that we made are glaring, but I would rather talk about how good some of the guys did and some of the positives.”

Zeigler-Namoa finished the game 1-for-5 at the plate with the big 3-run blow in the seventh while shortstop Jordan Donahue turned in a 3-for-4 performance at the plate with a run scored. Left fielder Kamana Nahaku broke up UH’s scoreless streak against the Anteaters with his RBI double in the top of the second inning, helping bring home a run for the Rainbow Warriors for the first time in more than 23 innings against UCI.

With the loss, UH drops into the elimination bracket with a chance to play back into a spot in the Big West Tournament championship game. Hawai’i will face the loser of the Cal State Fullerton-Cal Poly matchup on the other side of the bracket on Friday at 4 p.m. HT in an elimination game.

“We’re a tough ball club,” Zeigler-Namoa said to finish UH’s postgame media availability. “I think we ultimately stick together no matter what and I think teams don’t want to see us right now. We’re just sticking through it, grinding through it day-by-day and we’re just excited that we get to play another day tomorrow.”