Utah State University Student Newspapers | 2009-10-05 | Page 9

StatesmanSports Monday, Oct. 5, 2009 Page 9 Club Baseball USU takes 2-of-3 from Gate City Mavericks By DAN FAWSON staff writer On what was undoubtedly the coldest night of the young fall season, the Aggie bats caught fire early as USU cruised to a dominating 16-0 victory over the Gate City Mavericks. “We were finally selective at the plate,” said head coach Brett Al-amari, who has been preaching patience to his hitters all season. “We finally realized that you get three strikes for a reason. We were just selective and waited for pitches in the zone to hit and stayed aggressive the whole time even though we were being selective.” First baseman Erik Swensen got things started for Utah State with an RBI single in the first inning, effectively opening the floodgates in a rout, which would see the Aggies score consistently from start to finish. The Aggies tacked on two more runs in the second inning, highlighted by the first of left fielder Kelden Peterson’s two RBI-doubles. In his best performance of the season, Peterson went 3-for-5 at the plate, leading the team with 4 RBIs. USU followed with runs in the fourth, fifth and seventh innings, before closing the game with a six-run eighth inning, which saw 11 Aggie batters come to the plate. The Aggies tallied 15 total hits and had at least one runner reach base in all but one inning. For the second outing in a row, Ryan Doyle’s dominant pitching was somewhat overshadowed by a strong offensive performance. Doyle complemented the offense’s best performance of the season with arguably his finest, as well, striking out an astounding 15 batters on his way to a complete game shutout. Al-amari said the key to his star pitcher’s success was being able to consistently get ahead in the count and control opposing at-bats. “He just did a really good job of getting strike one,” Al-amari said. “He threw probably 90 to 95 percent fastballs for strike one and just got ahead of hitters and made it so that he was able to work in his changeup and his curveball. He was just fortunate to keep them off balance the entire game.” Commenting on the importance of getting ahead in the count, Doyle said he worked to get two strikes on each batter. “Once that happens you’re basically in control when you’re a pitcher,” he said. Despite his masterful performance, Doyle had no problem sharing the spotlight with his offense. “Anytime the offense scores a lot of runs you don’t really have any pressure as a pitcher,” Doyle said. “You can have confidence to go right at batters, not worrying about if they’re going to hit it.” Doyle said he believes Friday night’s victory was the team’s most complete game of the season, while also noting the team played the game a little shorthanded. “It’s even more impressive considering we’re missing a couple of our starters who weren’t here tonight,” he said. “(Brad) Singer wasn’t here, Gavin Johnson wasn’t here – definitely our most complete game.” Saturday Doubleheader Saturday was the same teams, different story. After exploding for a season-high 16 runs the previous night, the Aggies dropped the first game of their Saturday doubleheader against the Gate City Mavericks, 2-1. Behind both the pitching and hitting of Josh Rice, the Mavericks quieted what had been a streaking Aggie offense. Shaking off some early control issues, Rice struck out seven batters and was consistently able to silence potential Aggie rallies. He stole the show at the plate, as well. Trailing 1-0 in the top of the fifth inning, Rice helped his cause with a lead off home run to right field. The Mavericks followed with the go-ahead run two batters later, giving Rice all the support he would need in shutting down the Aggies. The Aggies were first to get on the board when shortstop Zack Gunn came home from third base on a wild pitch in the second inning, giving Utah State an early 1-0 lead. Momentum would soon be lost, though, as Gunn and his teammates were unable to capitalize on a number of opportunities to build on the early advantage. The Aggies stranded runners in scoring posi- Women’s Soccer Ags lose first WAC game since 2007 into the net. “We limited them a lot besides that,” Cairns said. In the last meeting between the two teams, In their first conference game of the season, Utah State beat the Wolf Pack 4-3 and went on the Utah State Aggies fell 1-0 on the road against to become the 2008 conference champions as their longtime rivals, the Nevada Wolf Pack, well as receiving first place in this year’s WAC Sunday. preseason coaches poll. However, the Aggies have The Aggies came out aggressively, outshootonly won one out of five games on the road this ing Nevada 7-3 in the first half, but the Wolf season and have struggled to keep the opposing Pack would be the only ones in the game to score team scoreless throughout an entire game. a goal, and that came midway through the 36th “I’m not concerned with that,” Cairns said. “I minute. have to say that for 90 minutes we played with “This is probably the first time this year that energy, we played with courage. It was really we’ve had a one of those loss and just days where we felt like we couldn’t get the played well ball to drop to and didn’t save our lives. need to fix a I thought we lot of things,” played a solid said USU head game on the coach Heather road, and in Cairns. “But as order to win in far as putting the WAC and the ball in the qualify for the back of the net, tournament, we couldn’t you have to proget the ball to tect your home drop today.” field and you The Aggies have to steal (5-7-1) had a some points number of away from peochances to ple on the road, score throughwhich isn’t an out the game, easy thing to including a do.” shot from The Aggies Utah State players Shantel Flanary, 7, and Chandra junior forSalmon, 33, collide with an Idaho State player. patrick oden photo are on the road ward Lauren again for both Hansen that hit the cross bar, a shot from junior games next weekend as they play at Boise State midfielder Heather Pond that hit the cross bar, and at the University of Idaho. Cairns said Idaho and a near perfect cross from freshman forward has been getting good results this year even Rachel Feuz to sophomore forward Shantel though its record doesn’t show it, and Boise State Flanary that just barely missed the upper 90. games are always very physical and highly con“We had a ton of chances today,” Cairns said. tested. “We got the ball in our opponent’s box a lot in “When you play the defending champions, dangerous spots, and we had a lot of opportunieveryone is going to have a little more spring in ties today and we were just unfortunate in not their step and a little more determination, and getting the ball to drop.” we’re just going to have to deal with that,” Cairns The goal scored by Nevada came off of a forsaid. “We control our own destiny, we’re not tunate half chance, in which the Nevada player going to let other teams control our destiny.” kicked it with the outside of her foot, causing an – [e-mail] awkward bend on the ball that allowed it to go By STEVE CRASS staff writer UsU’s brad singer slides into home plate during the Aggies’ game against Gate City Saturday. The Ags won 2-of-3 against the Mavericks during the weekend series. cody gochnour photo tion in each remaining inning, with the final stanza being particularly disappointing. Gunn led off the final inning with a double, which came up agonizingly short of clearing the fence in right field. After Doyle, who was playing first base, followed by moving Gunn to third on a groundout to Rice, neither of the Aggies remaining hitters were able to bring Gunn home and tie up the game. Al-amari said he felt the top half of his order was being over aggressive, seemingly forgetting the patient, selective approach that had served the team so well the previous night. “We were swinging at the first two pitches of every at-bat,” Al-amari said. “It seemed like we were popping a lot of balls up rather than sitting back and waiting for a good pitch to hit. After an anemic offensive showing earlier in the day, the Aggies won game two of their Saturday doubleheader in convincing fashion, cruising past the Mavericks, 9-0. The win concluded what was undoubtedly the Aggies’ best weekend series of the fall season. “We’ve played a few weekends now, and we’ve got a pretty good idea of where everyone is on the team,” said Gunn. “Everyone’s got their fair share of at-bats, so it was just a matter of time before we put it together.” Unlike Friday’s offensive performance, which was consistent from start to finish, the Aggies seemed to carry some of Saturday’s earlier offensive struggles with them into game two, waiting until late in the game before finally taking con- trol. Entrenched in a scoreless pitcher’s duel going into the bottom of the fifth inning, the Aggies finally broke through behind an RBI double off the bat of center fielder Dallin Christensen. The Aggies seized momentum, putting six runs on the board, capped off by Gunn’s two-run homer to left field. Gunn finished the day going 3-for-4 at the plate, with a game-high three RBI’s. While the Aggie bats stole much of the weekend spotlight, starting pitcher Cody Ferguson quietly helped the team cap off what may have actually been a more impressive pitching and defensive performance. En route to earning the victory, Ferguson pitched eight scoreless innings, allowing only three hits and striking out five Maverick batters. Despite his solid performance, however, Ferguson insists much of the credit belongs to the people playing behind him. Speaking about an improving Utah State defense that struggled with errors last weekend Ferguson said, “I don’t usually get a lot of strikeouts, so I rely on them to get outs for me.” Gunn echoed Ferguson’s praise of the defense. “I think the biggest thing for us is how our defense is playing,” he said. “I think we made (only) a couple of errors this entire weekend, which was the most positive thing.” – [e-mail]