UH wins Big West baseball opener

Matt LoCoco’s blooper to center fell in for a three-run double with two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning and Hawaii defeated UC Irvine 8-4 tonight in the Big West opener for both teams at Les Murakami Stadium.

Hawaii (12-14, 1-0) defeated UC Irvine (15-8, 0-1) for the first time in 10 Big West Conference games and it wasn’t easy.

UH took a 5-0 lead into the eighth inning but gave up four unearned runs on three errors that cut the lead to one.

Hawaii then answered with a single and two walks before LoCoco’s pop up found a spot to land between two diving Anteaters in shallow center to put UH ahead 8-4.

Brendan Hornung (3-5) took a shutout into the eighth inning and gave up four unearned runs on five hits in 7 2/3 innings with no walks and six strikeouts to earn the win.

Hornung lowered his ERA to 2.15.

Matt Valencia struck out pinch hitter Andrew Martinez with the tying run on second in the top of the eighth.

Valencia walked the first two batters in the ninth and was relieved by Kyle Mitchell, who got three straight outs to earn his first save.

LoCoco finished 2-for-4 with a walk and Marcus Doi was 2-for-4 with a double and two runs scored. Chayce Ka’aua added two hits and two RBIs and Jacob Sheldon-Collins was 2-for-4 with a run scored.

UH finished with 11 hits to five for UC Irvine and won for the sixth time in eight games.

The series continues Saturday night at 6:35.