By Chris Estrada (@estradadotc ):
Of the two comebacks San Jose State baseball showed in Saturday’s double-header, one of them worked in a 12-7 loss and an 11-10 victory as the Spartans improved to 2-1 on the young season.
Game one was all University of Northern Colorado. Building up a commanding 12-1 lead by the seventh inning, the Bears took control from the start.
Senior Kyle Morrison put the Spartans on the board in the second inning with his first career home run.
“I knew off the bat I had a chance but I didn’t want to take anything for granted,” Morrison said. “I was running the bases, trying not to smile.”
The Spartans had a dry spell after Morrison’s run, but fought back in the bottom half of the inning to drive in six runs. However, that was the last of their scoring in the first game.
Game two had a similar start. The Spartans once again showed early signs of pitching troubles, pushing them behind 8-1 by the fifth inning.
“The biggest challenge is when you are down by so many runs, just having the belief and the attitude that we can get back in this game,” said head coach Brad Sanfilippo. “We were competitive at bats and we asked the guys on the bound to keep up the temp a little bit.”
The SJSU offense came alive in the bottom half of the fifth to take back four runs thanks to Shane Timmons’ two-run RBI to narrow the gap in the Spartans’ comeback efforts.
In the seventh inning, SJSU’s offense exploded with six runs to take an 11-8 lead. Chris Williams got a huge hit knocking in Aaron Pleshner and Kellen Strahm to make it 8-7.
“It’s all about momentum and how it switches between games,” Morrison said. “They put up a seven spot on us, [so] for us to come back with four that inning was huge.”
Freshman pitcher Walker Brinkman made his debut throwing a solid 2.2 innings of relief to pick up the win.
Redshirt junior Tevin Cadola got the save-striking out the lone batter he faced, stranding the tying run on base.
The Spartans will finish off the four-game series against UNC today at noon. .