Sophomore reliever Nick Hoover held the Bruins (34-11) scoreless for 4 2/3 innings to earn the win, while freshman Evan Brock threw three perfect innings to earn his first save.
Senior first baseman Jeff Cusick doubled in two runs in the fifth inning to provide the difference and claim hero status once again. Cusick upped his team-leading total to 52 runs batted in and now has nine RBIs in his last two games.
And while UCI Coach Mike Gillespie continues to marvel at the year Cusick is having (hitting .397 with nearly a .500 on-base average and taking 141 career RBIs, which ranks No. 3 in UCI annals, into the final 10 regular-season games), he said pitching deserved the headlines Tuesday.
“Hoover [whose outing was the longest of his season] really picked us up and so did Brock [dubbed to start Saturday with Saturday starter Christian Bergman moving up to Friday],” Gillespie said. “They were really the story.”
“[Offensively] we get a flair base hit and a walk and then another big at-bat by Cusick. I don’t know that everybody really does understand what kind of a special year [Cusick] has already had and is having. We don’t have to talk about how long I’ve done this and I’ve had very few guys who have had years like this. Their names are people we’d know, like the Geoff Jenkins of the world.”
The win, in its last regular-season opportunity against a nationally ranked opponent, might create some postseason cachet for the ’Eaters (30-16), who have fallen out of the Baseball American top 25 and are in second place in the Big West.
Gillespie said the importance of the game prompted him to stay with Brock in the late going.
