(Photo: Joey Plishka/WCSN)
TUCSON – Baseball is a cruel game.
Arizona State Baseball came into Tucson for what is perhaps its biggest series of the season, riding a five-game winning streak and a hot hand at the plate into Hi Corbett Field with a chance to salvage a spot in the field of 64. Friday night was an absolute battle in nearly every aspect of the game, but it’s one that ASU lost.
“In a game like this, every out matters,” head coach Willie Bloomquist said. “Every pitch matters.”
With a chance to plate the go-ahead run in the ninth and tenth innings, Arizona slammed the door and sent the Sun Devils back to the bus with broken hearts when sophomore outfielder Chase Davis blasted a solo home run well over the Terry Francona Hitting Center in right field to walk it off in extra innings 7-6. As chippy as the contest was throughout, with constant jawing back and forth, ASU had its winning streak snapped and its chances of getting back above .500 – at least for the time being – since late February shattered along with it.
All this despite a massive, go-ahead homer in the seventh from graduate first baseman Conor Davis with boos greeting the veteran as he came to the plate following an altercation between him and sophomore center fielder Mac Bingham. The moment was pure poetry, but it didn’t hold its magic through to the end.
“That was a special moment for him,” Bloomquist said. “It was a big moment in a big rivalry game and with the crowd being the way they are here. A lot of fun for him and our guys but we fell short which stings a little bit.”
Davis drove home three in a 3-for-4 performance to begin the series.
It was also the first game that sophomore infielder Hunter Haas was back in the lineup as a starter for the first time since the BYU series at the end of February. Haas added ASU’s sixth and final run on an RBI single in the eighth.
Arizona broke the ice in the second inning when junior right fielder Tanner O’Tremba singled home a pair with two outs. This, after redshirt junior left-handed pitcher Adam Tulloch – making his first Friday start since March 18 – worked out of a bases-loaded jam with nobody out in the first.
Tulloch let two more runs come to pass in the third, letting up a trio of hits before hitting O’Tremba with the bases loaded to bring across another run, and then things got chippy. Both men took exception to each other over the course of the at-bat, with O’Tremba sharing some words with Tulloch on his way down to first base as he pointed out to the mound.
Tulloch wound up channeling his anger as best as he possibly could, responding to the two-run third inning by striking out the side on 14 pitches in the fourth. He was pulled in the fifth for redshirt sophomore right-hander Christian Bodlovich but finished by punching out four of the last seven batters he faced.
While it hasn’t been pretty, Tulloch has grinded through 13.1 innings over his last three starts, notching 15 strikeouts in the process.
“[Tulloch] battled,” Bloomquist said. “He didn’t have his greatest stuff but he battled. He gave us an opportunity to win and that’s a starting pitcher’s job.”
In the subsequent innings following Davis’ massive homer, Arizona made the Sun Devil bullpen work furiously to keep a lead they inevitably relinquished intact. Bodlovich got four outs and only surrendered one hit before sophomore righty Jared Glenn met his match in the bottom half of the seventh.
He gave up a pair of singles before getting a big third out on a line drive that redshirt sophomore center fielder Joe Lampe flagged down in the left-center field gap to end the inning, leaving two men stranded in scoring position.
The next inning wasn’t as kind to Glenn, and a two-run eighth for the Wildcats tied the game with the former of the two being plated on an RBI triple from Bingham. The RBI single to cap off that frame from freshman first baseman Tommy Splaine inevitably forced extra innings.
ASU keeps its entire back end of the bullpen fresh for the remainder of the series, and while using Glenn to start the eighth came back to bite Bloomquist, it’s a silver lining nonetheless.
“We were trying to ride [Blake Pivaroff] and [Glenn] as long as we could,” Bloomquist said. “We wanted to save some bullets for tomorrow because we’re going to need them. It’s nice that we still have some guys left down there that are capable.”
Sophomore right-hander Blake Pivaroff was the last man ASU would run out before the end of the night, going two innings with a pair of strikeouts in the effort.
At the plate, early mishaps in the field and on the bases hurt the Sun Devils to start but some questionable officiating, particularly behind the plate, made for intense discourse between batters and home plate umpire Joe Burleson all night. Bloomquist acknowledged that it was a factor but understands that it’s part of the game.
“In a game like this you have got to be better,” Bloomquist said. “[Arizona] had some calls go against them. I preach to our guys to leave the arguing to me, we’re early in this series. I don’t want to get on their bad side but I wasn’t really thrilled.”
Both Tulloch and sophomore right-hander TJ Nichols often found themselves on the receiving end of gracious calls for most of the night, occasionally getting the short end of the stick as well.
ASU is once again a game below .500, 8-8 in Pac-12 Conference play but on a night where emotions were at a high along with palpable intensity that swung in every direction, the loss still looms at the forefront of both Bloomquist and his team’s mind.
“Our guys aren’t going to back down,” Bloomquist said. “That’s what makes it a rivalry.”
