Baseball 2/6/2016 7:00:00 PM UCSD

Larsen Walk-Off in Nightcap Gives No. 26 Tritons Pair of One-Run Wins Over The Master's on Opening Day

LA JOLLA, Calif. - The 26th-ranked UC San Diego baseball team earned a pair of one-run victories over The Master's College, 3-2 and 4-3 in 10 innings, to sweep a non-conference doubleheader on Opening Day Saturday at Triton Ballpark.

UCSD thus begins the year at 2-0. TMC, ranked No. 10 in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), dropped its first two games of the young season and fell to 5-2 overall following its first road action of 2016.

Junior rightfielder Jack Larsen pulled a walk-off RBI single that skipped through the right side as redshirt sophomore catcher Steven Coe sped around third base and just barely slid around the play at the plate to end the nightcap, which was scheduled for the regulation nine innings, in the bottom of the 10th.

UCSD continues a 13-game season-opening homestand with a busy six-games-in-four-days weekend ahead, beginning with a primetime tilt with UT-Permian Basin on Thursday night, Feb. 11. First pitch at Triton Ballpark is set for 6 p.m.

Game One
John Erhardt led a trio of Triton arms to starring roles in the opener. The redshirt sophomore right-hander, making just his second collegiate start, went a career-long 5.0 innings and earned his first winning decision for UCSD. He allowed just two runs on a two-run home run by Collin Nyenhuis in the fifth inning that made it a 3-2 game, with just three other singles and a pair of walks against him.

True freshman Kyle Mora and redshirt freshman Cameron Kurz (Encinitas/La Costa Canyon HS) followed with their respective college debuts. Mora tossed three no-hit frames, walking two and fanning two. He posted UCSD's lone 1-2-3 frame of game one, coming on for a perfect sixth. Kurz took the ninth and procured his first save, working around a two-out single after a strikeout looking to his first batter.

Offensively, the Tritons scored twice in the third as junior second baseman Vince Mori (Oceanside/Palomar College) was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded ahead of a sharp RBI single to center by redshirt sophomore designated hitter Justin Flatt.

What proved to be the game-winning run came in the very next frame. JD Hearn, like Mori a junior newcomer, out of UC Santa Barbara, led off by dumping an opposite-field double into the right field corner. Coe then followed suit and slapped an opposite-field single through the right side to put Tritons at the corners. With one gone, the TMC infield had difficulty with Brandon Shirley's high chopper and speed, with Hearn coming home.

UCSD dodged a bullet in the seventh as Mora got out of jam nursing the one-run edge. With Mustangs at the corners and two away, Nyenhuis lined out to Mori. The Tritons had several other nice defensive plays, the first two by senior first baseman Zach Friedman. Erhardt retired the first two batters in a five-pitch third on two tosses, with Friedman making the tough scoop off of Hearn's low throw from third on the latter. Friedman then out-did himself in the fourth, diving into the hole before flipping just in time to the charging Erhardt for the first out.

Larsen in the fifth in right and senior Gradeigh Sanchez in the eighth in left, made difficult outfield grabs the rest of the way, with Sanchez going up against the fence.

Senior right-hander Brad Lohse (1-1), who the Tritons knew from his past two years at archrival Chico State, took the loss allowing three runs, one earned, in five frames.

Game Two
UCSD took a 3-1 lead on Mori's first home run as a Triton, also the first long ball of 2016 for UCSD, in the bottom of the seventh. TMC, however, struck for two runs in the ninth, getting back-to-back-to-back singles and a sacrifice fly following a called third strike by Jack Rupe, Jr. (San Marcos/Mission Hills HS).

After the Tritons came up empty in the ninth, Coe opened the 10th by getting hit by an 0-1 Danny Lutz (0-1) offering. Tyler Howsley put down the sacrifice, his second on the day after a team-leading 10 a year ago. With two away, senior leftfielder Gradeigh Sanchez worked a five-pitch walk, ahead of Larsen's heroics on another 0-1 pitch. Larsen had been 2-for-8 with three swinging strikeouts and UCSD's lone error in the lead-up, but made all that go away in his final stroke of the day.

The Tritons had overturned an early 1-0 deficit, courtesy of a two-out shot to left by Nyenhuis in the first, with a two-run fourth. An infield Sanchez single, throwing error on a sacrifice attempt and wild pitch put two runners in scoring position. Sophomore designated hitter Tyler Plantier (Poway/Del Norte HS) then grounded one toward the hole for an infield RBI single. Two more wild pitches by able TMC starter Conner Menez plated Larsen.

Senior right-hander Alon Leichman tossed five effective frames, allowing the one run on a pair of hits and one walk, while striking out four. He put together 1-2-3 frames in the second and fifth, and used a 4-6-3 double play to get out of the fourth. Freshman left-hander Brent Bell went the final 1.1 innings, ending the ninth by starting a pickoff ahead of a perfect 10th with two swinging strikeouts around a comebacker, and benefitted from Larsen's walk-off to the tune of a first career win.

Once again, the Triton defense was on full display. Howsley, UCSD's junior shortstop who has provided many a gem in the past with his glove, arguably topped anything he's done before to end the first after the home run by Nyenhuis. Off the bat of Mustang catcher David Sheaffer, he laid out completely deep into the hole, and when it looked like the effort was only good enough to keep the ball on the infield, got to his feet and fired to first, where Friedman made perhaps an equally tough play to go full-stretch to gather just in time. In the eighth, Mori made the fancy flip and Howsley spun and fired for a second twin killing of the 4-6-3 variety. Redshirt freshman Michael Palos, in his college debut, showed off the arm on a perfect dart to Mori to get Max Maitland trying to swipe second to end the sixth.

Triton Notes: UCSD is 4-1 in season openers under fifth-year head coach Eric Newman, and 13-3 in its Division II era (since 2001) ... Tyler Howsley has started 59 consecutive games, all at shortstop, dating back to the 2015 opener ... John Erhardt's starting assignment was the second of his college career, the other coming at home against Point Loma on Feb. 17, 2015 ... Alon Leichman's start in the nightcap marked his 13th in a Triton uniform ... Infielders JD Hearn and Vince Mori made their Triton debuts in the opener as starters, with five others making the first appearance of their college careers on the day in redshirt freshmen Erik Amundson, Cameron Kurz and Michael Palos, and true freshmen Brent Bell and Kyle Mora ... Palos started the nightcap behind the dish.