Cal Poly hands ’Bows fifth straight loss

History has repeated itself in a bad way for the Hawaii baseball team.

For the second straight year, the Rainbow Warriors have followed up a series win against Santa Barbara with five straight losses to drop out of the Big West race early.

Hawaii managed just five hits against No. 4 Cal Poly, which pieced together enough offense to pull out a 4-3 victory on Saturday night in front of a Les Murakami Stadium crowd of 2,556.

Mark Mathias had two doubles and scored a run for the Mustangs (29-5, 7-1), who kept pace with UC Irvine to remain tied for the league lead.

Hawaii (14-18, 2-6) fell four games under .500 for the first time since the Nevada series four weeks ago and is in a three-way tie at the bottom of the standings after starting out 2-1.

"It’s disappointing because it’s such a fine line," Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said. "You’re one play away, you’re one swing away, you’re one pitch away from the winning the game."

Hawaii trailed 4-2 in the bottom of the ninth when Stephen Ventimilia drew a leadoff walk and Marc Flores walked with two outs. Adam Hurley followed with a ground ball that got under the glove of Mathias at second, allowing Ventimilia to score and Flores to reach third.

Cal Poly brought in closer Reed Reilly, who earned a three-inning save on Friday, to finish it again. UH third baseman Juliene Jones fought off two straight 3-2 pitches before striking out to end it.

Hawaii left 12 men on base.

"They’re 29-5 because they will take advantage of your mistakes and they’re playing with confidence," Trapasso said. "It’s a tough night because our kids battled. (Cal Poly) made a mistake to let us back in it, but we just couldn’t get that one hit, not only in that last inning but three or four times in the game."

Hawaii’s hitless streak reached 11 innings before catcher Steven Pollakov legged out a single to right field to lead off the bottom of the fifth.

UH, which hadn’t had a hit since the second inning of Friday’s 3-2 loss, put a runner on second for the third straight inning and finally cashed in.

Junior Kaeo Aliviado doubled for the second straight game, lifting one over Nick Torres’ head in right to score Pollakov from second.

Junior Bryan Granger relieved starter Slater Lee with Aliviado on second and Ventimilia on third and struck out Jordan Richartz on three pitches.

Flores popped up to shallow left, forcing Tim Wise to go to his knees to make a run-saving catch to keep the Mustangs in front 2-1.

Lee allowed two hits but walked five in 4 1/3 innings.

Cal Poly got him the lead with runs in each of the first two innings off Hawaii starter Scott Kuzminsky.

Kuzminsky (3-4) was tagged for six hits in the first three innings after throwing 44 of his 57 pitches for strikes.

"Until the last couple of innings he was not very sharp even though he was getting ahead (in the count)," Trapasso said. "I honestly thought that (Kuzminsky) settled down and showed some great toughness to keep us in the game when early on we were not able to figure Lee out."

Brian Mundell just beat a double play at first to allow Mathias, who led off the game with a double, to score the first run.

Wise singled to lead off the second and scored on the back end of consecutive bunts to give Cal Poly a 2-0 lead.

Jordan Ellis got back the run UH scored in the fifth with a two-out RBI single in the sixth to bring in catcher Chris Hoo, who doubled with one out.

BIG WEST STANDINGS

Saturday
Cal Poly 4, Hawaii 3
CS Fullerton 11, UC Santa Barbara 9, 11 inn.
UC Santa Barbara 3, CS Fullerton 2
Long Beach State 2, UC Davis 0
UC Irvine 5, CS Northridge 4
*Oregon 7, UC Riverside 4
*non-conference

Sunday
Cal Poly at Hawaii, 1:05 p.m.
CS Fullerton at UC Santa Barbara
CS Northridge at UC Irvine
Long Beach State at UC Davis
*UC Riverside at Oregon
*non-conference

NO. 4 CAL POLY 4, HAWAII 3

E—Mathias; Wise; Van Gansen; Jones 3. DP—Cal Poly 1. LOB—Cal Poly 12; Hawaii 12. 2B—Mathias 2; Hoo; Aliviado. HBP—Mathias. SH-Allen; Van Gansen; Hoo; Wobrock. SF—Wise. SB—Mathias; Ellis; Torres; Ventimilia; Jones. CS—Drobny.

HBP—by Kuzminsky (Mathias). PB—Pollakov. Umpires—(Plate): Dave Gimbi. (First): Rob Hansen. (Third): Dwayne Finley. T—3:30. A—2,556.