On a night that celebrated its 1976 national championship team, Arizona couldn’t put together a performance befitting a champion.
The Wildcats kept it close for a majority of the game, but Texas Tech’s powerful batting was too much in a 9-5 loss on Friday night at Hi Corbett Field in the opener of a 3-game series.
Former Arizona star Ron Hassey had the honor of throwing out the first pitch while representing the 1976 championship team. There were many other players from the team that went out for the first pitch, and then proceeded to shake the hands of the current team before it took the field.
“I was really happy to see a lot of those guys, and they did such great things for us,” UA coach Chip Hale said. “Arizona baseball has always been a great athletic program here, but they were the ones to push it through and get it to get the national championship.”
Following the pregame festivities, Owen Kramkowski got the game started for Arizona forcing Texas Tech to pop up, ground out, and then earned his 33rd strikeout of the season.
Nate Novitske had a fly out to center field to start the batting for Arizona. Caleb Danzeisen singled up the middle and was followed by Tony Lira being walked.
Texas Tech denied the Wildcats any chance at scoring with a double play off of a Maddox Mihalakis grounder. The Red Raiders did not find any luck in the second inning as two ground outs and a fly out kept the game scoreless.
Andrew Cain started the bottom of the second inning with a double to right field, but no one behind him could bring him in. Jackson Forbes struck out swinging, Beau Sylvester flew out to center field, and Carson McEntire struck out looking.
The Red Raiders started the third inning with three straight singles to load the bases with no outs. While Kramkowski was able to get his second strikeout, a fly out to right allowed Texas Tech to bring a runner in and take a 1-0 lead.
A single through the left infield allowed another run to come in for the Red Raiders. Some confusion between Sylvester and Lira on an easy pop up resulted in an error and brought in another Texas Tech runner.
Luckily, for Arizona, a grounder ended the inning before Texas Tech could do more damage.
A Texas Tech error allowed Novitske to get to first. Danzeisen was walked to put two on for the Wildcats and Lira then singled to left field to load the bases.
Mihalakis hit another single for Arizona, this time to right field, which brought in Novitske and Danzeisen to put Arizona on the scoreboard.
With two still on base for the Wildcats, it was Cain who loaded the bases again by hitting a single to right field. Forbes would strike out swinging and a ground out by Sylvester ended the inning with Arizona only trailing by one run.
The fourth inning was not as offensively flashy for Texas Tech as two ground outs and Kramkowski’s third strikeout made it a quick top of the inning.
McEntire started the bottom of the fourth with a single through left field. A fly out by Gavin Triezenberg and a Novitske ground out did bode well for Arizona, but McEntire proceeded to steal second and eventually advance to third.
A high single by Danzeisen ended up bringing in McEntire to tie the game at three. Danzeisen advanced to second off a wild pitch and was then brought home by a Lira single up the middle to give Arizona the lead going to the fifth inning.
A deep double to center field allowed Texas Tech to get to second. A sacrifice bunt got the runner to third and was brought home by a deep sacrifice fly out to tie the game at four.
Despite a pair of singles from the Red Raiders and a wild pitch, Arizona was able to get out of the top of the fifth inning with the game still knotted at four.
Back to back singles by Forbes and Sylvester were followed by McEntire being walked. The bases were now loaded with no outs for Arizona. Triezenberg hit a grounder that resulted in McEntire being out at second but brought in Forbes to give the lead back to the Wildcats.
Novitske was walked to load the bases once again for Arizona. However, a Danzeisen pop and a Lira line out ended the inning with three left on base.
Arizona started the top of the sixth inning strong with a fly out and line out. However, Texas Tech responded with a double and single to get runners on first and third. Kramkowski’s night ended there and Maclain Roberts was brought in to replace him.
The Wildcats went to the bottom of the inning with the lead still intact after a Red Raider fly out. Unfortunately, for Arizona, it was unable to add to its lead.
A single to left field and a triple down the right field line for Texas Tech brought a runner home and the score was once again tied. The Red Raiders followed it up with another single which brought in the runner from third to give the lead back to Texas Tech.
Roberts’ night came to an end and in came Matthew Martinez to try and stop the bleeding for Arizona. However, the bleeding continued for the Wildcats and the Red Raiders took advantage.
Back to back singles brought in another run for Texas Tech. Eventually Arizona found a way out of the top of the seventh but it was then a very quick three up, three down for the Wildcats took the game to the eight inning.
While Texas Tech did ground out twice, a walk ended Martinez’s night and brought in Evan Brandt. A grounder on fielder’s choice helped Arizona get out of the inning without more damage being done by Texas Tech.
Arizona did not find any more offense, while Texas Tech added two more runs in the top of the ninth inning. The Red Raiders took care of the lead to end the night with a game one victory.
Playing through injuries and some inexperiences leaves Arizona searching for sustained success. Hale hopes that his team keeps fighting through the learning process.
“Just keep fighting, just keep going,” said Hale in his message to his team. “I just don’t want them to get discouraged. Disappointed, that’s okay, but discouraged, I don’t want that. It’s hard, I know they’re winners, and they want to fight, so we just have to keep pushing, and the only way to get through it is to get a win.”
Fans left Hi Corbett with frustrations of another loss, but Hale’s message to the fans is one of continued belief that his team will figure it out.
“I know that there’s people and fans and supporters that aren’t happy, and my message to them is we aren’t happy either,” he said. “We’re going to push it and we’re going to get better as the season goes on, and we’ll make them proud of the A.”
As far as Saturday’s game goes, Hale hopes his team can clean up and avoid some of the mistakes made in game one.
“Just play cleaner baseball,” said Hale. “We dropped a pop up again today, and those types of things come back to really haunt you late in the game.”
