ASU Baseball: Sun Devils overcome ninth-inning Huskie home run to win in extras

(Photo: Dominic Cotroneo/WCSN)

The Arizona State Sun Devils (25-11, 13-5) squeaked by with a 6-5 win on Sunday over the Washington Huskies (21-16, 7-11) thanks to a 10th-inning double from pinch-hitter Zach Cerbo and resiliency from the pitching staff.

The win for the Sun Devils notches them their sixth consecutive conference series win.

The Sun Devils were on the board first after three consecutive singles loaded the bases for David Greer, who laced an RBI single and brought home Chris Beall and gave ASU the early 1-0 lead.

Despite the hot bats to start off the game, ASU left the bases loaded to end the inning–a theme that would become prevalent for the Sun Devils throughout the game.

ASU left-handed pitcher Brett Lilek threw a solid first inning, but ultimately wasn’t able to replicate his string of successful outings.

Washington followed up with a single and a double to load the bases and continued its scoring on a wild pitch by Lilek and a groundout that allowed catcher Joey Morgan to score.

Lilek struggled in the second, giving up a leadoff home run to Alex Schmidt to tie the game. Lilek continue to battle a high pitch count until he was lifted after 4 1/3 innings of work.

The Huskies held a 3-2 lead after ASU snuck out another run on an Andrew Snow double in the subsequent frame.

ASU catcher Brian Serven then tied the game at three apiece in the top of the fifth, as he crushed a fastball over the left field fence.

The Sun Devils reclaimed the lead in the sixth, after a double from Trever Allen was followed by a sac-fly, a walk and an error that allowed Allen to score. The Sun Devils were unable to put any more across, stranding three runners, but entered the seventh up 4-3.

Chris Beall added a cushion in the next frame, roping an RBI double to score Snow and put the Sun Devils up 5-3.

The Huskies were quick to erase that cushion, however, as the bottom of the eighth saw Erives surrender a lead-off home run to second baseman Josh Cushing, which put Washington back within one.

Huskie closer Troy Rollings started off the ninth with a 1-2-3 inning, giving his team its best chance of a late rally. It turned out that was just what the Huskies needed, as catcher Austin Rei jumped on a Ryan Burr offering and slammed it over the left center fence to knot the game back up at five.

Burr avoided the walk-off and a complete meltdown, though, and stranded the go-ahead runner with two strikeouts to send the game into extra innings.

Continuing its string of close-game success, the Sun Devils ultimately persevered.

R.J. Ybarra hit a leadoff single to right that was followed by a sac-bunt to set the stage for Cerbo. Cool and collected, Cerbo gapped a double to quickly give the lead back to ASU going into the bottom of the tenth.

With the tying run on third, two outs and a 2-2 count, Ryan Burr avenged his recent late-game demons and notched a game-ending strikeout to give ASU the win.

The Sun Devils will take on rival Arizona on Wednesday in Tucson at 7 p.m. The game will be aired on the Pac-12 Network.

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