Erickson ties saves record in win

IRVINE — Senior closer Blair Erickson is providing more than All-American quality at the back end of the bullpen for this year’s UC Irvine baseball team.

So while Erickson’s 46th career save capped an 11-7 nonconference win Sunday over visiting Utah and allowed him to tie the Big West Conference career saves record, Erickson was more eager to goad than gloat.

“It’s just another save,” said the 6-foot-1, 225-pound right-hander, who had 17 saves as a freshman, 10 as a sophomore, 13 last season and now six in 2007. “We got the W, which is what counted today. But it wasn’t pretty and it certainly showed we have a long way to go. I mean we can’t get complacent, because we haven’t done anything yet. Me, personally, I have a very sour taste in my mouth from the last two times we went to [the NCAA] regionals [eliminated with two straight losses in 2004 and 2006]. It feels good to take care of business, but you’ve got to look at the big picture. We’ve got some guys wondering where we are in the rankings and all that stuff. Personally, I think that’s all worthless.

“We got off to a really hot start my freshman year [13-3-1], but we started patting ourselves on the back too early. We need to take a lesson from that. It’s still 13 games into the season [now 10-2-1 and on a 10-game unbeaten streak]. We’ve played well at times, but you tend to dwell on the negatives, because we’re still trying to do better every game.”

UCI Coach Dave Serrano said such words of leadership from Erickson represent his significant progress as a teammate.

“I’m very proud of [Erickson],” Serrano said. “He has come from a guy who kind of did things on his own, to one of the best teammates in this program right now. His teammates recognize that he has been superb.

“I mentioned to him before the USC game [Tuesday] that he was having fun this year and he told me this was the best team he has ever played on. And I don’t think he meant just ability wise. I think he was talking about the guys he is around each and every day. He’s sold on our program and I’m really pleased that he has that record [shared with Gabe Gonzalez of Long Beach State from 1992 to 1995]. Hopefully, he’ll break a few more down the line.”

Erickson recorded the final two outs on strikeouts, giving him 13 in 6 1/3 innings this season. His presence was necessary when Utah (2-11) scored three in the eighth and one in the ninth, after UCI had broken open a 3-3 tie with a five-run seventh inning.

Four freshmen preceded Erickson to the mound for the Anteaters, including Reid Suitor, who made his starting debut. Suitor worked into the sixth, allowing three earned runs and six hits.

Former starter Daniel Bibona bailed Suitor out of a jam with one out in the sixth, as he incuded a 4-6-3 double play from the first hitter he faced.

Bibona, who lowered his ERA from 7.15 to 6.23, then struck out the side in the seventh to restore some of his confidence.

“Danny is analytical about things and I think he thinks too much,” Serrano said. “Bringing him in in that situation [runners on first and second with one out after Utah had taken a 3-2 lead] he didn’t have time to think. We got him up in a hurry, he got loose, and, boom, he was in the game.”

Bibona’s outing turned into his first collegiate win as the ‘Eaters tied the score in the sixth and erupted for five runs on four hits in the seventh.

“I was starting and I’d been struggling, but the coaches still believed in me and put me into that situation,” Bibona said. “Things just worked out. That double-play ball was a big confidence builder, knowing I could go out and do what I’d been doing all fall [getting hitters out].”

Junior catcher Aaron Lowenstein, whose three-run triple capped the Eaters’ big seventh, said Bibona should benefit from his performance Sunday.

“He’s a young pup, and he’ll learn,” Lowenstein said. “But today he really took a step up. He came in and had a presence on the mound, pounded strike one and hit his spots. You could tell he came out of there with a lot of confidence.”

Sophomore shortstop Ben Orloff led off the UCI seventh with a line single to center and senior Cody Cipriano, after bunting through two strikes, showed bunt, then pulled the bat back to take a full swing and singled to right to put runners on first and third.

Junior Bryan Petersen and senior Matt Morris were then hit by pitches, the latter forcing in the go-ahead run. After a flyout, senior pinch-hitter Zach Robinson lofted a bloop single to left to drive in another run and Lowenstein upped the lead to 8-3.

Cipriano and reliever Eric Pettis worked a brilliant pickoff move at second base to end Utah’s three-run eighth and UCI had four more hits to push across three runs in the eighth.

Morris’ two-run single in the eighth extended his hitting streak to 12 games and Lowenstein added an RBI single to make him three four five with four RBIs.

Ollie Linton, Cipriano and Tony Asaro had two hits apiece to help UCI’s 15-hit attack against six Utah pitchers. No fewer than 10 Anteaters had at least one hit, including Birthday boy Brock Bardeen, who lined a pinch single in the eighth.

Morris, in left field, and Petersen, in right, also made sterling over-the-shoulder catches while racing onto the warning track to help complete an errorless game for the hosts.

Suitor, who entered 2-0 in three relief innings, earned praise from Serrano for his first starting assignment. But his failure to get out of the sixth kept UCI’s total of qualify starts (six innings with three or fewer earned runs) to one this season.

“I’m very happy with the way this team is playing, but, realistically, we can’t continue to have this type of starting pitching and be successful,” Serrano said. “We’re going to have to find a mix of starting pitching that’s going to get us deeper into games. That’s going to make the games so much easier, because of how good our bullpen is.

“Our [relievers] are still fresh, because it’s early in the season, but we know we can’t keep using them this way. I have confidence our starting pitching will step up. It’s my responsibility to get that fixed.”

Nonconference

UC Irvine 11, Utah 7

Score by Innings

King, Foster (6), Wolfgramm (7), Askew (7), Bruneel (7), Krause (8) and Guymon; Suitor, Bibona (6), Pettis (8), Hamilton (9), Erickson (9) and Lowenstein. W -- Bibona, 1-0. L -- Foster, 0-2. Sv -- Erickson (6). 2B -- Petersen (UCI), Brossman (U), Asaro (UCI), Cusick (UCI), Welsh (U). 3B -- Lowenstein (UCI). HR -- Brossman (U).