The Arizona Wildcats played a game in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on Tuesday for the first time since 1954. They left Tucson the day before and had to check out of their hotel several hours before the first pitch.
The one-game road trip became a test of the players’ focus.
“We’re sitting around the lobby, sitting around our conference room for a couple hours before we left for the ballpark — and we left for the ballpark early,” UA coach Chip Hale said. “And the guys really stayed locked in and played really well.”
Arizona passed the test, defeating New Mexico State 15-5. Similar concentration and attention to detail will be required to navigate the next stretch of games.
Arizona (29-13) hosts Nevada (21-17) in a four-game series starting Thursday. Grand Canyon then comes to Hi Corbett Field on Tuesday. None of those contests will count toward the Pac-12 standings. But the Wildcats can’t afford to look past them.
Hale will remind his club of that before the Nevada series begins. He is hopeful he doesn’t have to repeat that message.
“We really focused on that yesterday, trying to just play that game and make sure we played with the same intensity that we did against Arizona State,” Hale said Wednesday. “We’ll have to keep that going. These guys are really good about that. They’re really good about understanding that these games, especially now, are really important.
“I hope we don’t have to say a whole lot. But we’ll see how they come out.”
Hale said every game from this point forward is “equally important.” They won’t all impact the conference race — in which the Wildcats currently sit in second place — but each will affect Arizona’s RPI, which is one of the main metrics the selection committee considers when determining seeds and regional hosts for the NCAA Tournament.
The one caveat to that approach: Hale and his staff will be more cautious with injured players in the non-conference games.
“We need to win the most we can,” he said. “Obviously, we want everybody to be healthy for our Pac-12 games. We can win the conference — we still have a chance to do that. We don’t want to put someone out there if they’re not healthy enough to play.”
Caulfield takes a leap
Arizona scored a season-high 15 runs against NMSU. No one contributed more to that effort than second baseman Garen Caulfield.
Caulfield had a career-high four hits in four at-bats, including his first UA home run. He drove in a career-high four runs and scored a pair.
Caulfield, a transfer from San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton, California, raised his batting average to .274. He has 26 RBIs despite typically hitting in one of the bottom three spots in the lineup.
Caulfield’s productivity doesn’t come as a surprise. He was Arizona’s top hitter in fall ball.
“A lot of line drives, uses the whole field,” Hale said. “Right-center was kind of his spot. He’s actually pulled some balls (lately). Got the home run to the pull side. He got a hit in the pull hole. So that’s a huge deal for him. If he can add that to his game, he can be a really good hitter for us.”
Caulfield has helped solidify second base after mainly playing third early in the season when Tony Bullard was unavailable because of injury. Caulfield won the job at second despite not playing in any games over two seasons in junior college because of the pandemic.
In addition to his hitting prowess Tuesday, Caulfield showed off his athleticism on the bases.
Arizona had runners on first and second in the sixth inning. Caulfield was the trail runner. Jack Grant hit a single to left. Tommy Splaine, who was on second, came around to score. Caulfield, thinking the throw would go through, steamed toward third. Third baseman Nolan Funke cut the ball off and dove to tag Caulfield, who leaped over Funke, landed on the base and kept his right foot on it as Funke made a second attempt to tag him.
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— NCAA Baseball (@NCAABaseball) April 27, 2022
“That was pretty cool,” Hale said. “He felt like at the time he was drawing a throw — (that) there was gonna be a really close play at the plate. It ended up it was pretty easily scored. So I was like, ‘Oh, I guess we just ran into an out.’ Next thing you know, he jumped over.”
‘Tonko’ Tuesday
Although Arizona scored 15 runs on 15 hits, the aspect of Tuesday’s game that stuck out most to Hale was the Wildcats’ pitching performance.
Freshman right-hander Anthony “Tonko” Susac had his second straight strong performance, this one coming in a notoriously hitter-friendly ballpark. Susac allowed three runs on five hits in five innings. He struck out one batter and didn’t issue a walk.
In his previous appearance at Creighton, Susac pitched three scoreless innings. It was the first time all season he didn’t surrender a run. The outing before that, he allowed five runs in 1 1/3 innings at Utah.
Hale said experience is the biggest factor in Susac’s recent improvement.
“There was a time there where he didn’t pitch a whole lot,” Hale said. “It’s hard to be better at anything you do in your life if you don’t do it. So getting him out there and letting him pitch and letting him have some rope has helped him.”
Reliever Chris Barraza also played an integral role in the win at NMSU. Barraza entered the game in the bottom of the sixth with the Wildcats leading 7-4. The Aggies had runners on first and second with two outs.
Barraza, a Tucson native who transferred to Arizona from NMSU in the offseason, struck out the next batter to end the inning. He then struck out the side in the seventh.
After a rough outing at Washington on April 3 — two earned runs in one-third of an inning — Barraza has lowered his ERA from 4.35 to 3.24.
Inside pitch
Right-hander Chandler Murphy (1-2, 9.50 ERA) is the scheduled starter for Game 1 vs. Nevada on Thursday. Murphy started Saturday vs. ASU but threw only 49 pitches. He’ll be followed by right-hander TJ Nichols (5-2, 4.31) and left-hander Garrett Irvin (4-2, 3.04). Sunday’s starter is TBA. It could be Susac (3-1, 8.16) or lefty Eric Orloff (1-1, 4.21) depending on how the other games go.
Arizona is projected to be a No. 2 seed in the latest field-of-64 projections by Baseball America and D1Baseball.com. BA has the Wildcats going to the Fort Worth Regional featuring TCU as the No. 9 overall seed. D1 has them in Coral Gables, Florida, where No. 3 overall seed Miami would be the host.
Freshman right-hander Josh Randall hasn’t pitched in a game since April 5. Hale said Randall has been working on his mechanics, with a goal of throwing more strikes. Randall has issued 13 walks in 11 2/3 innings. He threw a simulated game Monday. “He looked much better,” Hale said. “So I hope to get him in this weekend at some point.”
Tanner O’Tremba (.374) and Daniel Susac (.369) rank first and fourth, respectively, in the Pac-12 in batting average. O’Tremba ranks third in RBIs (43). Susac is tied for sixth (40).
Nevada ranks in the top 20 nationally in batting average, on-base percentage, hits and runs. Senior infielder Joshua Zamora leads the Wolf Pack in home runs (10), RBIs (52) and average (.388). Nevada is 242nd in ERA (6.78).
Sunday’s game has been pushed back one hour. It is now scheduled to start at noon.
