VANCOUVER - The UBC Thunderbirds picked up a pair of 8-2 wins in their doubleheader with the College of Idaho Coyotes on Sunday, giving the 'Birds three wins in the four-game set to take over second place in the Cascade Conference.
Offensively the T-Birds were red-hot through the final three games of the series, and they put up some big numbers early in both games on Sunday to seize momentum and give their starters some confidence. Rookie starter
Bryan Pawlina took advantage of that in game one, giving UBC a second impressive start from a freshmen in the series after
Jeremy Newton threw seven innings of one-hit ball on Saturday. Pawlina allowed just one unearned run on three hits in six innings, striking out five to pick up the win.
"Getting that really solid start from
Bryan Pawlina was great," said UBC head coach
Terry McKaig. "That's back to back days with freshmen on the mound giving us good starts with
Jeremy Newton going yesterday, and that bodes well not only for this spring, but in the future as well. We have some talented freshmen on the mound."
The 'Birds got to Coyotes starter Michael Garza in the third with some quality slugging from the top of the lineup.
Jerod Bartnik smacked an RBI triple to kick things off, followed by an RBI single from
Greg Densem and an RBI double from
Andrew Firth to make it 3-0.
They added five more in the fifth inning with a huge two-out rally aided by a couple of Idaho errors. The big blows in the inning came from an
Austin Fruson two-run double and RBI singles from
Jeremy Kral and
Kevin Biro.
Game two was a similar story, with the 'Birds jumping out to a big lead thanks to the meat of the batting order coming up with some big hits. This time it was a five-run first, with Firth's bases-clearing double over the left fielder's head doing most of the damage.
UBC's top four hitters in the lineup combined for eight hits in game two. Firth once again led the offence, going 9-16 in the series with six RBI. Densem was 5-13 with two RBI and four walks.
But even more encouraging for McKaig and the 'Birds was the big weekend from Biro coming back from injury. He looked to be in top form, going 6-12 with four RBI, adding a big solo home run to left field to cap off game two on Sunday.
The only offensive blemish in the series for UBC was game one, when Idaho's ace Ryan Eddy threw eight tough innings to help the 'Yotes earn a shutout. Two weeks ago it was a similar story against Concordia, when the 'Birds had their way offensively with most of the staff, but struggled significantly against ace Alex Bos. McKaig said he's happy with what he's seeing from the offence overall, but they need to be better against top-level pitching, which they can expect to see plenty of come playoff time.
"We saw some different looks and different speeds from them on the mound but I thought overall we did pretty well to adjust to that after the Eddy game. That's two weekends in a row that we have allowed a starting pitcher to completely shut us out, and come playoff time that regional tournament is going to be really up for grabs with five teams all really capable of winning it. Everyone is going to have one or two arms that are capable of shutting you down, and I think we've shown that we're going to be one of the stronger offences in the tournament, but you can't get shut out. You have to be able to battle your way to two, three or four runs in those close playoff games to win."
Sean Callegari got the win for UBC in game two, going five innings and striking out four, allowing two runs on five hits.
Alex Webb and Miles Verwheel each went two scoreless innings in relief.
Brady Winfield took the loss for College of Idaho, allowing seven runs over 4.1 innings. George Casper allowed one run on four hits to finish off the game. Nick Muncy was the one Coyote who looked consistently locked-in at the dish in the series. He had at least one hit in each game, and accounted for five of his team's 19 total hits in the series.
The Coyotes fall to 16-12 overall and 7-5 in conference play. The sweep sees UBC overtake Idaho in the Cascade Conference standings at 9-3. The 'Birds are 15-9 overall.
Next up for UBC is a four-game set at Simpson University in California. They have a week off from conference play the following week before returning home on April 12 to start a home series with Corban College.
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