What’s typically been a tough weekend got off to a rough start for the Hawaii baseball team.

UC Riverside held Hawaii to five hits and Thomas Walker went 3-for-4 and scored both Highlanders runs in a 2-1 victory over the Rainbow Warriors on Friday night.

Kekai Rios recorded his fifth three-hit game of the season and Jacob Sheldon-Collins and Ethan Lopez had the other two hits for Hawaii (19-26, 8-11 Big West), which dropped to 4-10 in one-run games.

“We hit a lot of balls right on the nose early in the game but right at people and it just wasn’t our night,” Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said. “You’ve got to get more than five hits even if you’re hitting balls hard.”

A boisterous Les Murakami Stadium crowd of 1,771 included many of the families of the nine seniors who will participate in graduation ceremonies today.

Hawaii will have to wait until a doubleheader on Sunday to try to avoid a fifth consecutive losing series.

UH is 2-10 in its past 12 BWC games and has lost 11 of 13 overall.

Austin Sodders (5-4) allowed one run in six innings to pick up the win for UC Riverside (22-25, 9-8).

Three relievers held Hawaii without a hit over the final three innings, with Alex Fagalde striking out two over 1 2/3 innings to earn his second save.

Hawaii dropped the opener of a Big West series at home for the first time all year. UH was swept last season by Cal State Fullerton while playing at home during graduation weekend.

“We were fine. The guys played their (butts) off,” Trapasso said. “We just didn’t get the hit when we needed to.”

Walker got the Highlanders on the scoreboard first with a one-out single in the fourth inning. He beat the throw at third from Marcus Doi in left on Casey Worden’s base hit and scored on a Colby Schultz grounder to second.

Hawaii starter Kyle Von Ruden worked his first 1-2-3 inning in the fifth but gave up his second run in the sixth inning on Michael Farris’ two-out single to right to score Walker.

Hawaii squared up four or five balls for line drives through the first five innings off of Sodders but had nothing to show for it.

Hawaii left two on in the second inning and Alex Fitchett struck out for the second time in the fourth inning to strand two more.

Sheldon-Collins snapped a 1-for-10 skid with a leadoff single into center to start the sixth inning and Hawaii loaded the bases with one out after Rios reached on his third hit.

Lopez, who singled in the second inning to extend his hitting streak to 11 games, lifted a sacrifice fly to right on the first pitch from Sodders to score Sheldon-Collins.

Fitchett worked a 3-2 count with the tying run on third but swung through a high fastball for his third strikeout of the game to strand two more.

Sodders was lifted for a reliever to start the seventh inning and finished with eight strikeouts, which are the most by a Big West pitcher against UH this season.

Von Ruden went 6 2/3 innings for Hawaii and allowed eight hits and two runs for Hawaii. He walked two and failed to strike out a batter for the second consecutive start.

Walker doubled to lead off the top of the eighth and he moved to third with one out. Lawrence Chew won a nine-pitch battle with Schultz, who grounded out to first for the second out. Cody Culp came in to face the right-handed hitting Farris and got the inning-ending grounder to short to keep it a one-score game.

Sheldon-Collins worked a 12-pitch walk to lead off the bottom of the eighth inning and took second on a sacrifice bunt. UCR coach Troy Percival brought in Fagalde, a right-hander, who got out of the inning with two straight bang-bang plays at first.

BIG WEST BASEBALL

FRIDAY

UC Santa Barbara 3, Cal State Fullerton 2

Cal State Northridge 5, UC Davis 4

Cal Poly 9, UC Irvine 1

UC Riverside 2, Hawaii 1

**Long Beach State 6, San Jose State 2

**–nonconference

TODAY

UC Davis at Cal State Northridge, 10 a.m.

Cal State Fullerton at UC Santa Barbara, 11 a.m.

**San Jose State at Long Beach State, 11 a.m.

UC Irvine at Cal Poly, 3 p.m.

**–nonconference

SUNDAY

UC Irvine at Cal Poly, 10 a.m.

Cal State Fullerton at UC Santa Barbara, 10 a.m.

UC Davis at Cal State Northridge, 10 a.m.

**San Jose State at Long Beach State, infox0A10 a.m.

UC Riverside at Hawaii (DH), 12:05 p.m.

**–nonconference

UC Riverside 2, Hawaii 1

E–none. DP–none. LOB–UCR 10, Hawaii 8. 2B–Walker. 3B-none. SH–Worden, Doi, Ramirez. SF-Lopez. SB-Sheldon-Collins. CS-none.

Umpires–(Plate): Will Van Raaphorst. (First): Frank Pflugradt. (Third): Carl Coles.

T–3:14. A–1,771.