Hawaii’s first trip off island in more than a month didn’t cool its recent hot streak.
The Rainbow Warriors came up clutch late to rally from a four-run deficit and knock off UC Davis 6-5 in 10 innings on Friday in the opener of a three-game series at Dobbins Stadium in Davis, Calif.
Jacob Sheldon-Collins, who tied a career high with four hits and had three RBIs, scored the go-ahead run on Marcus Doi’s sacrifice fly in the extra frame to give Hawaii (14-15, 3-1 Big West) its eighth win in 11 games.
Matt LoCoco went 3-for-6 with a career-high three runs scored to extend his hitting streak to eight and Hawaii finished with 18 hits to nail down its best start in conference since joining the Big West.
“That’s our biggest win of the year,” Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso said. “There’s no question about that because the character we showed was really impressive. Nothing was going right in any phase for us.”
UC Davis (8-16, 1-3) jumped all over Hawaii starter Brendan Hornung, who had his worst outing of the season.
Hornung gave up five runs — all in the first two innings — on eight hits in five innings.
UH trailed 5-1 after the second inning but slowly crept back into the game.
UC Davis didn’t score over the final eight innings. Hawaii senior Cody Culp (2-1) picked up the win throwing 4 1/3 innings of one-hit ball with no walks and five strikeouts.
He retired the final 11 batters he faced.
“He was money,” Trapasso said. “I think that was as good as we’ve seen him in two years. He was throwing firm and attacking and spotting up.”
All nine starters had at least one hit and the top four hitters in UH’s lineup combined to have 12 of UH’s 18 in the game.
LoCoco is hitting .444 (16-for-36) with eight runs scored during his hitting streak and has led off the game reaching base seven times in the last 10.
His single was the first of four straight hits in the top of the eighth inning to help Hawaii tie the game 5-5 after trailing by two.
Sheldon-Collins singled for his second four-hit game of the season with one out in the 10th inning and took third on an error and a passed ball.
Eric Ramirez, who had three hits, drew a walk and Doi drove in his second run with a sacrifice fly to give UH its first lead since the first inning.
“We ended up with 18 hits and we felt if we could just hold them and put up some zeros, we’d have a chance because of the way we were swinging the bats,” Trapasso said. “We had some big, big hits.”
Culp lowered his season ERA to 1.44 and has given up only one run over his last 13 innings.
Sheldon-Collins is now hitting .410, while LoCoco has seen his batting average jump 82 to points to an even .300 during his hitting streak.
UH freshman catcher Kekai Rios, who was 1-for-2 with two walks, left the game after a two-out hit in the seventh inning.
He was replaced by David Noworyta, who threw out a runner stealing second to kill a scoring opportunity for the Aggies in the bottom of the inning.
“(Rios) was cramping up from the fourth or fifth inning on,” Trapasso said.
UCD starter Robert Garcia allowed three runs on nine hits in six innings and reliever Blake Peters (3-3) took the loss, giving up six hits and two runs in three innings with one walk and two strikeouts.
The series continues this morning at 10.