ASU Baseball: Devils Fail to Complete Comeback at Cal
By Joseph Caulo
ASU baseball plate four unanswered runs, but aren’t able to dig selves out of 6-0 hole at California on way to eighth conference loss.
ASU baseball (12-16, 2-8) came into today already bleeding from slow starts in previous Pac-12 games.
On Friday, it was giving up five runs to the Golden Bears in the first two innings that made a comeback too far of an uphill climb.
On Saturday, a four-run third inning put California up 5-0, and Tracy Smith’s squad was not able to get enough guys around the bases to complete a comeback.
Chaz Montoya, the freshman lefty making his third start of the season for the Sun Devils, had trouble locating his pitches.
The six earned runs accompanied by five walks issued by Montoya helped build the early deficit.
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A silver lining to the freshman’s tough outing today is that he is getting important experience.
The Golden Bears know how to swing the bat, scoring fifteen runs and tallying 25 hits thus far in the series.
Montoya went out there and competed for five innings, and that drive is what any coach will be happy to see.
The Sun Devils’ bats were not silent today, but it took a while for them to start making noise.
A sixth inning home run to left field by Tyler Williams put ASU on the board for the first time.
Andrew Shaps stepped up to the plate right after Williams and knocked a ball over the right field wall. A Gage Canning RBI double later in the inning cut the California lead to just three.
After a scoreless sixth inning pitched by Alec Marsh, Shaps made things real interesting with a double that brought Williams home. That put the Sun Devils well within striking distance entering the final two innings trailing 6-4.
Nobody was able to come through down the stretch though, and the Sun Devils end up dropping another conference game.
Coach Smith will have to rally the troops in order to salvage a victory on the trip to Berkeley.
A 2-8 conference record has ASU at the bottom of the conference standings.
The wins will need to start coming for the Sun Devils, otherwise the postseason will not come.
Next: ASU Baseball: Pac-12 Swoon Continues in Rainy California
ASU will give it a go again tomorrow at 2 p.m. in hopes to get some kind of momentum started heading into a midweek game against UNLV.