The UC Santa Barbara Baseball team (29-15, 15-8 Big West) relied on two veteran leaders to get across the line Saturday night at Cal State Bakersfield (18-27, 9-14 Big West), with four-year Gaucho Corey Nunez driving in three of his team’s four runs and Santa Barbara native Chase Hoover locking down a five-out save to secure the 4-3 victory.
Nunez’s three hits and three RBIs are both season highs, with Hoover’s save his joint-team-leading fourth of the year.
The Gauchos did all the damage they needed to do early, getting on the board with their first two plate appearances of the night.
Liam Barrett walked, took second on a wild pitch, third on a failed pickoff attempt, then home on Nunez’s RBI double. Nunez would advance to third, then score on Rowan Kelly’s sacrifice bunt.
The Roadrunners responded with a solo home run off of Gaucho starter Calvin Proskey in their half of the first, but that would be all. Noah Karliner helped preserve Santa Barbara’s 2-1 lead with a laser beam throw from right field, cutting down Bakersfield’s lead runner trying to reach third base.
Even better, the Gauchos got that run back in the top of the second. Xavier Esquer punched a single through the left side of the infield, then made a good read on a ball in the dirt to get to second base, setting him up to score on Nunez’s RBI single.
Nunez was involved again when Santa Barbara extended its lead to 4-1 in the fourth, with Barrett’s one-out single preceding yet another RBI double for the Gaucho shortstop.
Proskey made that lead stick with perfect second and third innings, then by working around a pair of walks in the fourth. After the lead-off man got on to start the fifth, Cole Tryba replaced Proskey on the mound and retired the next three Roadrunners he faced on strikes, needing just nine pitches to do it — an immaculate inning.
Walks got more ‘Runners on the bases against the Gauchos in the sixth and the seventh, though Tryba got out of the trouble both times. It was relatively easy in the sixth, with the lefty retiring three batters in a row with two more punchouts, but the seventh was more dramatic.
Tryba faced loaded bases with two outs, but got out of it. His night finally ended in the eighth, though he left two runners aboard. Both of them would come home to score on a one-out double that cut the margin to one run and brought Hoover out of the bullpen.
A strikeout and a groundout got the former San Marcos Royal out of the eighth with the lead still intact, and he was perfect in the ninth. After starting the inning with a strikeout, a grounder and pop fly both went right to Nunez and the Gauchos slammed the door.
Elsewhere, Santa Barbara got more help in The Big West standings, with UC San Diego and Cal State Fullerton both 0-2 in their weekend series and two games adrift of the Gauchos.
Santa Barbara will look to complete a sweep of the Roadrunners in Sunday’s series finale, with first pitch scheduled for 1 p.m. from Hardt Field.
Fans can catch all the action live on ESPN+ or by following along with live stats and a free audio-only broadcast at ucsbgauchos.com.