No. 24 ASU baseball ended March in style, receiving its first nod into the Top 25 this season after sweeping Utah on the road. Despite the calendar turning to April, the Sun Devils didn’t miss a beat on the first day of the new month.
On April Fools’ Day, the Sun Devils (20-9, 7-2 Big 12) weren’t fooled by Cal State Fullerton in a 14-4 run-rule victory at Phoenix Municipal Stadium to pick up their sixth win in eight games. It also marked their 40th all-time win over the Titans.
“These two programs historically don’t get along really well, but there’s a lot of mutual respect for each other,” ASU head coach Willie Bloomquist said. “Don’t take this lightly … We’ve done that the past two weeks, you know, in our midweeks.”
On Tuesday night, Bloomquist deployed a pair of sophomore right-handed pitchers. Wyatt Halvorson started the game, holding the visitors scoreless in his two innings on the mound. Derek Schaefer followed, only allowing two hits and a run while striking out two batters.
The Maroon and Gold burst into the lead with the help of freshman left fielder Brandon Compton. His three-run home run carried 465 feet, landing well past the Whiteman Family Performance center in right, and gave his team a 4-0 lead.
That catalyzed a stretch of eight unanswered runs for the hosts over the first three innings. Senior first baseman Jacob Tobias logged two runs on a single in the second, reaching second base on an error. Junior third baseman Nu’u Contrades added two runs in the third with a standup double.
Cal State Fullerton erased its scoreless start in the fourth inning with an RBI single from junior designated hitter Max Ortega. It added three more in the fifth.
But ASU baseball plated two more runs in the next inning. A sacrifice fly from junior second baseman Kyle Walker scored junior center fielder Isaiah Jackson before freshman infielder Landon Hairston notched an RBI single.
“I’m sticking to my approach for the most part,” said Hairston, who grew up in the Valley and graduated from Casteel High School. “There’s a couple at bats where I get out of it, but fighting with two strikes is pretty big for me. (The) coaches have harped on that pretty much all year.”
Thus, the Maroon and Gold were primed for the run rule in the seventh inning. Senior right-handed pitcher Will Koger closed out the game after replacing sophomore left-handed pitcher and infielder Cole Carlon, who logged the first out and pitched the sixth inning.
“We’ve progressed a lot, every single arm,” Carlon said about the pitching unit. “There’s no one else I’d rather be with, so it’s just great. We enjoy being around each other and it’s just a fun environment.”
Every Sun Devil hitter tallied at least one hit in the game. Additionally, the first five batters had at least two RBIs. This included redshirt junior infielder Kyle Walker, who extended his hitting streak to 17 games.
“I see myself as an aggressive hitter,” said Walker, who went 2-for-3 on Tuesday night. “I don’t think that’s something that’s going to change, and it hasn’t changed. I’ll just continue to swing at pitches in the zone.”
“You guys didn’t believe me when he was hitting .083 and I said ‘he’s having great at-bats, (but) he’s not finding holes,'” Bloomquist added. “He’s continuing to put together solid at-bats. That’s all we ask for. He’s the table setter [and] tone-setter for this lineup.”
Bloomquist also played junior outfielder Kien Vu, who made his first start since Mar. 14 against TCU. He held the eighth spot in the lineup on Tuesday night, going 1-for-2 before being pulled in the bottom of the fourth for graduate catcher Josiah Cromwick.
“I put the lineup up and left the DH hole open today during batting practice to wait and see how he was doing,” Bloomquist said about Vu. “He’s obviously still not running at 100% on that ankle, but I did want to get him at bats today if he felt good enough, and he did.”
ASU baseball will look to maintain its winning ways on Friday against in-state rival Arizona (20-8, 6-3 Big 12). The clash will be the first of a three-game series at Phoenix Municipal Stadium. It will be the second meeting this season between the two sides, with the Wildcats taking the first contest 3-2.
“If you think you have arrive because you are ranked, you haven’t,” Bloomquist said. “We’re not where we want to be. It’s nice that people are starting to recognize, what we’re capable of, but we haven’t played our best baseball yet. We have higher aspirations of continuing to climb the ladder and get to where we want this program to be and where it can be.”
Leave a Reply