SAN JOSE, Calif. » In the beginning, there was nothing. But in the big inning, there were crooked numbers. For the second consecutive day, Hawaii used a big inning to take control of the game at Municipal Stadium. The Rainbows’ three-run fifth on a hot Saturday afternoon led to a 4-1 win over San Jose State.

Jarrett Arakawa didn’t need much. He was dominant, going 7⅔ innings and allowing one run on five hits, lowering his ERA to 1.69. One of the hits shouldn’t have even been a hit — Matt Lopez hit a ground ball to second baseman Stephen Ventimilia in the seventh and Ventimilia then uncorked the wildest throw this side of Chuck Knoblauch, sending the ball high and wide right, missing first baseman A.J. Bayus by at least 10 feet. Somehow, the play was scored an infield single.

“He’s been a rock for us this year,” Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said of Arakawa. “He was really good today in this weather and this heat, he just pitched ahead in the count with mostly fastball-change, he didn’t throw the curveball very often. He was able to really locate the fastball good. And had them put the balls in play.”

Arakawa didn’t get into too much trouble, retiring 12 men in a row at one point. When he finally tired in the eighth, putting two men on with two outs, Brent Harrison came on and needed only one pitch to get out of the jam, inducing Nick Schulz to chop one up the middle, where shortstop Pi‘ikea Kitamura calmly snagged the ball and then stepped on second to end the threat.

“It’s huge,” Arakawa said of Harrison’s one-pitch rally-kill. “He’s been nails all year and picked me up then.”

Harrison finished the game for his sixth save of the year.

“Coach told me right when I came in, ‘This guy can swing it, so let’s go with your sink and keep the ball down’,” Harrison said. “First pitch I just threw it right down the middle, had a little sink on it and he hit it right into the ground, so it worked out good.”

Once again, San Jose State (18-16, 3-2 Western Athletic Conference) took the early lead. Michael Gerlach hit a one-out triple in the second and scored on Kyle Gallegos’ groundout. That would prove to be the only hit for the Spartans until the sixth inning, when pinch hitter Andrew Rodriguez singled.

The Rainbows (23-15, 4-1) wasted a couple of opportunities in the early innings, including leaving the bases loaded in the fourth. However, in the fifth, they finally broke through. Garrett Champion got it started with a double — his third in two games. Ventimilia sacrificed him to third, where he remained as a hit batsman and an infield error loaded the bases. Jason Kafka then sent a pitch to the backstop, with Champion scoring and the other runners moving up.

Trevor Podratz delivered the big hit, shooting a line drive inside third and down the line. Both runners scored and Podratz was thrown out at second trying to stretch. It was part of a 3-for-4 day for Podratz, who was the designated hitter.

Podratz was good-natured when asked about getting thrown out at second.

“I’d like to not talk about the getting-thrown-out part,” he said with a laugh. “Today, the ball looked big to me. I knew I wasn’t going to see a lot of fastballs unless they really needed to come at me, so I tried to just work in my counts. I got a fastball earlier in the count, which I wasn’t expecting, so I wasn’t going to wait around to see any more offspeed. I was just jumping on it when they gave it to me and just took it where it was thrown.”

Saint Louis School product Kalei Contrades again started as the designated hitter for San Jose State. He went 0-for-4.

“Jarrett, the main thing, he’s throwing strikes,” Contrades said. “He was slowing down our bats and he was just dealing today. He mixes up his speeds really good. He has a nice strong fastball and he has a nice changeup that slows down our bats.”