On Friday night, Arizona State tied a program record on the base paths in a stunning loss to Oral Roberts.
The Sun Devils stole 10 bags in the evening, matching the record set back in 2001. The speed on the dirt trails helped ASU create offense without swinging the bat on several occasions, though it wasn’t enough late in the game.
“We did a lot of stuff on the bases,” head coach Willie Bloomquist said postgame. “We got walked seven times and had a significant amount of stolen bases. We just couldn’t finish the job offensively so I was disappointed in that part of it too.”
However, ASU stranded 11 baserunners in the game. While the aggressive decisions on the bases set up scoring opportunities, the Sun Devils continually failed to cash in.
Junior right fielder Kien Vu led the team with three steals for the night, bringing his season total to seven. Vu finished just one steal shy of tying his coach’s school record for most steals in a single game with four. Junior center fielder Isaiah Jackson, redshirt sophomore left fielder Brandon Compton and redshirt junior second baseman Kyle Walker all wound up with two steals.
The aggressive baserunning kicked into gear in the third inning, when the Sun Devils rallied for three runs on just two hits. Walker reached base by beating out a potential double play ball. Then, he swiped second and third base on consecutive pitches and eventually scored.
Vu stole second base soon after, and an errant throwdown allowed him to scamper to third. Subsuquently, Vu and Compton pulled off a tricky double steal in which Compton drew a throw while trying to steal second, allowing Vu to cross the plate and extend the lead.
“He’s an aggressive kid,” Bloomquist said of Vu nearly tying his steals record. “Just trying to depict the right opportunities for him to go. He’s done a good job of taking advantage of the things he’s seeing.”
ASU has not possessed much game-changing speed on its roster in the past few years. This season, however, Bloomquist has several players who can start rallies all by themselves with their quickness.
The Sun Devils stole 52 and 53 bases in the past two seasons, respectively. After Friday night, they have already taken 18 bags from their opponents, a pace Bloomquist hopes will continue.
“We’ll try to get our keys, and if our keys allow us to run, we will,” Bloomquist said. “Today, we had a key on their guy [Oral Roberts pitcher or catcher] and we were going to keep running until they stopped us, as long as he kept doing what he was doing. So, we kept getting on base, we’re gonna keep running.”
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