Fresno State Athletics
Fresno State
Nevada
'Dogs Outlast Nevada To Even Series
4/12/2015 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
By: Andrew Rich
arich1221@mail.fresnostate.edu
GoBulldogs.com
FRESNO, Calif. -- After four hours and thirteen minutes, the Fresno State baseball team was able to end a six-game losing streak by outlasting Nevada, pulling out a wild 14-10 win over the Wolf Pack on Saturday night at Beiden Field.
The heated Mountain West rivals combined for 24 runs and 29 hits in the marathon game. It was the first win over Nevada (27-8, 13-4 MW) in five tries this season for the Bulldogs.
Fresno State (17-18, 8-6) fell behind 3-1 after an inning and a half of play, but took the lead for good with a huge second inning.
Austin Guibor led off the bottom of the second with a hit by pitch and Kevin Viers followed it up with a two-run home run to right field to tie the game up at three. Ryan Dobson and Brody Russell followed that up with singles that put runners at the corners for Korby Batesole. The freshman put down a perfect safety squeeze bunt for a base hit that allowed Dobson to score and give the Bulldogs a 4-3 lead. Fresno State would add two more runs in the inning to push the lead to 6-3.
After the Wolf Pack cut the lead to 6-5, the Bulldogs scored one in the fourth and then exploded for another big inning in the fifth.
An eventful bottom half of the fifth inning opened with singles from Guibor and Viers and a walk to Dobson to load the bases with no outs. Russell then hit a groundball to Nevada third baseman Bryce Greager. The Wolf Pack junior overthrew the catcher and Guibor and Viers were able to score to push the lead to 9-5. After a walk to Batesole, it loaded the bases again. Taylor Tempel singled to right to score two more runs and make it 11-5. However, the rivalry hit a boiling point at that time.
After the runs scored, Batesole attempted to advance to third but was tagged out by shortstop Kyle Hunt. However, a hard slide on the play resulted in a scuffle between Batesole and Hunt and both benches cleared. A total of seven players and both head coaches were ejected as a result of the incident.
The Bulldogs added another run in the frame and then put up single runs in the sixth and seventh to push the lead to 14-5.
But the Nevada offense wouldn't go quietly into the night. The Wolf Pack put up a five-spot in the eighth to make it 14-10 and then loaded the bases in the ninth and had their No. 3 hitter, Ryan Howell at the plate.
Fresno State turned to senior captain Garrett Mundell to shut the door. He got Howell to fly out to right and then struck out Jay Anderson to secure the victory.
The two teams will square off on Sunday afternoon at 1:05 p.m. in the rubber match of the three-game series.
"Be Bold!" - The official home of the Fresno State Bulldogs is 940 AM ESPN Radio.
