Grand Canyon on Tuesday provided Arizona with a stern test and a sneak preview.
The Lopes came to Tucson with a win over the Wildcats on their résumé, an RPI of 34 – two spots higher than the UA – and recent postseason experience. GCU is exactly the type of team Arizona will face in the NCAA Tournament next month; the two, in fact, squared off in last year’s Tucson Regional.
The Lopes won the rubber match of their three-game season series, defeating the Wildcats 11-7 in front of an announced crowd of 2,624 at Hi Corbett Field. All three games were won by the visiting team.
UA coach Chip Hale said GCU (31-15) is “as good” as any Pac-12 team the Wildcats have faced this season. Catcher Daniel Susac said the Lopes are one of the two best teams the Cats have played. The other: Texas State, which took two of three from Arizona in early March. The Bobcats are 35-11.
GCU has wins this season over No. 2 Oregon State, No. 10 Stanford and No. 17 Texas Tech (twice).
“They were well-prepared every time we played them,” Hale said. “It was a good three-game series, and they beat us.”
GCU was Arizona’s final non-conference opponent of the regular season. The Wildcats have three Pac-12 series left – at USC, vs. Oregon State, at Oregon – before playing in the inaugural conference tournament.
Arizona (32-15) rallied from a 7-3 deficit, tying GCU in the eighth. The Lopes responded with a four-run ninth that began with a misplay by left fielder Chase Davis, who slipped in pursuit of Dustin Crenshaw’s line drive, turning it from a single into a triple.
“We're not playing ‘no doubles.’ We're trying to take away hits,” Hale said. “So Chase is coming to get it, and he just had a hard time pulling up.”
Jonny Weaver’s single past a drawn-in infield drove in Crenshaw. Tayler Aguilar then delivered the decisive blow, a three-run homer off Trevor Long. It was Aguilar’s second homer of the night and team-leading 17th of the season. He went 4 for 5 with five RBIs.
Long, who came into the game with a 1.33 ERA, allowed four runs without recording an out.
“Trevor's bailed us out many times this year,” Susac said. “We gotta do a better job bailing him out sometimes, picking each other up as a team.”
Arizona fell into a familiar pattern at the start of Tuesday’s game, falling behind 2-0 on Aguilar’s two-run homer off freshman left-hander Eric Orloff.
The UA faced early multiple-run deficits in the first three games of last week’s series against Nevada. The Wildcats won two of them. But Hale knows that isn’t a formula for success and made it a point of emphasis heading into Sunday’s series finale. Arizona led that one wire to wire.
The Wildcats were chasing the Lopes all night long. GCU expanded its lead to 4-1 in the third inning. Arizona scored a run apiece in the third and fourth to make it 4-3. The Lopes responded with a pair of runs in the sixth off reliever George Arias Jr., who hadn’t allowed a run in his previous six appearances. The lead grew to 7-3 in the seventh.
The Wildcats kept clawing back. They scored once in the bottom of the seventh to make it 7-4. Then they broke through in the eighth, plating three runs to tie the score 7-7. Four consecutive hits accounted for the rally – a single by Mac Bingham, a double by Garen Caulfield, a triple by Tommy Splaine and a single by Tony Bullard.
Arizona tried to advance Bullard to second, but pinch hitter Tyler Casagrande failed to get down a sacrifice bunt. Bullard ended up stranded.
“We had a chance to go ahead with nobody out and a man on first,” Hale said. “We just didn't execute the bunt.”
Orloff pitched decently in his second start of the season, allowing four runs on six hits in five innings. He struck out five batters and walked only one.
Orloff’s previous start came in the home opener against GCU – a 19-3 setback. Orloff was the victim of poor defense that night. He yielded four runs in 1 2/3 innings, all of which were unearned. Arizona committed a season-high seven errors.
The Wildcats have come a long way since then. But they still couldn’t defeat the Lopes.
Inside pitch
Bingham’s single extended his on-base streak to 33 games. Earlier, he was robbed of an extra-base hit by GCU left fielder Cade Verdusco, who made a leaping catch of Bingham’s blast toward the wall in the second inning.
Bullard had a season-high three hits in four at-bats.
GCU’s 17 hits were the second most Arizona has allowed this season. The UA yielded 18 hits at New Mexico on March 23. The Lopes had 16 hits in the first meeting.
