‘Bows plug away at plate

Pi‘ikea Kitamura didn’t need a reminder about the last time Hawaii had more than a week off during the baseball season.

"I just think back to my freshman year when we had that bye before New Mexico State," he said before practice Tuesday. "We went on a run, went to regionals, and sometimes it just takes (getting a break).

"The way that our season was going, it was good to take a break, take a step back, and recharge the batteries."

Hawaii gets back at it after seven days off when the Rainbows (2-15) host Wichita State for the first of five games tonight at 6:35 at Les Murakami Stadium.

The Shockers (11-8) provide the final tune-up before Hawaii opens play for the first time in the Big West next week when it hosts UC Santa Barbara.

After snapping an 11-game home losing streak with a 2-0 win over Gonzaga last Tuesday, UH took two days off before practicing Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The focus of those practices was pretty simple.

"We just hit, that’s all we did," Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said. "I don’t think we took ground balls for more than five minutes."

The Rainbows have to score runs if they are to turn around their season.

Through Sunday, Hawaii ranked 281st out of 296 Division I teams with a .218 batting average, and its 2.4 runs per game ranked as the fourth-worst in the country.

The numbers offset a fielding percentage of .984, which is sixth best in the country.

The Rainbows have committed only 11 errors in 17 games.

"We want to hit the reset button on things we haven’t been doing well but keep sharp on the things we have been doing well," Trapasso said. "Starting pitching and defense in the last series was outstanding, and we’ve made some changes in our approach during our practices this week and want to be more aggressive."

Hawaii has won six of its past eight against Wichita State, which plans to start four right-handers in the series.

The Rainbows will counter with their same rotation they used against Gonzaga, with seniors Connor Little and Corey MacDonald at the top of the rotation.

Sophomore Stephen Ventimilia is beginning to find his stride at the plate as Hawaii desperately searches for players to get hot with the bat.

A bad back kept him out of practice for two weeks in the spring, but he’s beginning to look like the player who hit .293 with a .399 on-base percentage and 42 runs scored as a freshman.

Ventimilia has hit safely in each of his past three starts and contributed to both runs in the win over Gonzaga last Tuesday, driving in Austin Wobrock with a base hit and scoring on a single by Marc Flores, who leads UH with a .282 average.

"My name of the game is to get on base to score runs, and that’s on me as well because when I’ve gotten on base I haven’t been as aggressive as I should," Ventimilia said. "I’m definitely going to be more aggressive."

After starting the season hitting .118 (2-for-17), Flores is batting .409 (9-for-22) with three doubles, a homer and five runs scored in his past six games.

Trapasso said Tuesday that junior Andrew Jones will have surgery this week on a torn ligament in his left elbow and will miss the rest of the season.

Freshman Quintin Torres-Costa will rest another 10 days before further evaluation.

Torres-Costa, the 2012 Hawaii high school pitcher of the year from Waiakea High, injured his elbow in batting practice on the road in Las Vegas.