‘Bows battle back

Long Beach State’s NCAA tournament hopes took a hit against Hawaii once again.

The Rainbow Warriors handed reigning Big West freshman of the year Chris Mathewson the worst outing of his career in a 6-3 victory over the Dirtbags on Friday night to snap a five-game losing streak before a Les Murakami Stadium crowd of 1,849.

Johnny Weeks matched his season output with two doubles and Alex Fitchett’s two-run single came during a five-run fourth inning for Hawaii (19-23, 8-8), which won its fourth straight game against LBSU (26-18, 9-7).

The Dirtbags are ranked 24th in this week’s Collegiate Baseball poll and had an RPI in the top 40. But that will drop with the loss to Hawaii, which was coming off a 1-6 road trip.

“I thought it was a complete game and a character game for our guys,” Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said. “We were disappointed with our road trip … but they were focused on getting back to doing things again like we know we’re capable of doing.”

Mathewson, a freshman All-American with a 1.94 ERA last season, dropped to 5-4 and gave up career highs of nine hits and six runs in 62⁄3 innings.

Marcus Doi finished with three of 10 hits by the Rainbow Warriors, who are 9-5 in their past 14 home games and improved to 8-0 in conference play when scoring at least five runs.

“We went back to playing good defense and our hitting has been streaky, but hopefully we’re going to get hot at the right time going down the stretch,” said Weeks, whose two-out double in the seventh inning gave UH a 6-3 lead.

Kyle Von Ruden improved to 6-1, allowing three runs on six hits over six innings with one walk. Senior Lawrence Chew retired all nine batters he faced to earn his first save since 2013.

“Kyle said he was gassed and gave us everything he had (after six innings),” Trapasso said. “I thought the story of the game was Lawrence Chew coming out and going nine-up and nine-down and saving the bullpen, saving (Cody) Culp and (Matt) Valencia for games two and three, which is huge for us.”

Mathewson has lost both career starts against UH, which swept the Dirtbags at their place last season to knock them out of a potential NCAA regional.

The game was headed for a repeat of last season’s 1-0 victory for Hawaii against the right-hander until the bottom of the fourth inning.

Weeks’ one-out double resulted in the first runner of the game reaching scoring position and started a huge inning for the ’Bows.

Jacob Sheldon-Collins drove him in with a base hit and scored on Doi’s RBI single for a 2-0 lead.

Seven straight batters ended up reaching base, with Fitchett clutching up for a two-out, two-run single on a 3-2 pitch from Mathewson.

A throwing error allowed Ethan Lopez to score from first and cleared the bases for a 5-0 UH lead.

“I’ve been striking out a lot at the slider in the dirt, and the 2-2 pitch was a slider in the dirt and I took it,” Fitchett said. “I knew that I was putting together a good at-bat and he threw me a fastball outside and I was able to hit it to the right side and score a couple of runs.”

LBSU trimmed the lead with runs in the next two innings off Von Ruden, who was making his first series-opening start for Hawaii.

The Dirtbags put the first two runners on base in the fifth but were held to one run when catcher Kekai Rios threw out his 18th base stealer of the season, ranking second in the Big West.

Garrett Hampson led off the sixth with a single and scored on Brock Lundquist’s RBI triple off the wall in center.

Long Beach State cut the lead to 5-3 and would have gotten closer if not for Weeks robbing Luke Rasmussen of a hit with a diving stop and throw from third base prior to Lundquist’s fourth triple of the season.

“That’s a double down the line and now you’re in a real dogfight, but that was a great play (by Weeks),” Trapasso said. “When you’ve got a four-run lead and you’re in the middle-to-later innings it’s about shortening the game and getting outs and taking care of the baseball and that’s exactly what that play really helped us with.”

BIG WEST BASEBALL

Friday

Hawaii 6, Long Beach State 3

UC Davis 6, UC Santa Barbara 2

Cal State Fullerton 2, UC Riverside 1

**UC Irvine 4, UCLA 2, 10 inn.

Today

Long Beach State at Hawaii, 6:30 p.m.

UC Santa Barbara at UC Davis

UC Riverside at Cal State Fullerton

**UCLA at UC Irvine

Cal Poly at CSUN (doubleheader)

**–nonconference

Hawaii 6, Long beach state 3

E–Muzzi, Sheldon-Collins. DP–LBSU 2. LOB–LBSU 4, Hawaii 3. 2B–Weeks 2, Ramirez, Rojas. 3B-Lundquist. HBP–Weeks. CS–Muzzi.

HBP-by Mathewson (Weeks).

Umpires–(Plate): Kelly Gonzales. (First): Joe Maiden. (Third): Gary DiFabio.

T–2:47. A–1,849.