The No. 20 Gauchos were edged out in their game two matchup with visiting Nevada on Saturday evening as the Wolfpack found two late runs to even the series.
The UCSB baseball team fell 5-4 and will look for the series win in tomorrow’s rubber match.
Mike Gutierrez earned the start tossing five full innings and allowed just one earned and struck out five in the no-decision. Five Gauchos came in his relief including Matt Ager who had a good outing tossing two innings of one-hit ball.
Kyle Johnson stayed hot going 2-for-4 with a game-tying homer and bringing in a late lead run with an RBI single. He has reached base safely in every game this season.
Broc Mortensen went 2-for-4 as well with an RBI and Jason Willow extended his hit streak to 13 games with a double.
Mortensen gave UCSB an early lead, collecting an RBI single in the first inning to score Jordan Sprinkle and Willow made it 2-0 in the second with an RBI groundout.
Nevada answered in the fourth with a pair of runs and took the lead in the fifth driving in one more to go up 3-2.
In the bottom of the fifth, Johnson unleashed a towering solo shot to ice the game and the Gauchos got the lead back in the 7th with Johnson striking again on an RBI single through the left side.
In the top of the eighth Nevada plated two more on a tough ball that skipped past the Gaucho infield with the bases-loaded. Had the ball traveled a regular path it could have turned for a double-play to get the Gauchos out of the inning, but instead it gave the visitors a 5-4 lead.
UCSB brought the tying run to second base in the bottom half but could not bring him home.
Daniel Moebus-Bowles writes about sports for UCSB.
email: sports@newspress.com
