First baseman Austin Bush smacked two nose-bleed-inducing home runs to power UC Santa Barbara to a 7-2 baseball victory over Hawaii on Thursday night.

A Les Murakami Stadium crowd of 1,148 saw Bush rocket a homer to right in a five-run third and add a solo blast to right center in the fifth.

Bush, a 6-foot-6, 265-pound junior, has hit a Big West-leading 20 home runs this season. In the past 10 games, he has hit 10 home runs with a slugging percentage of 1.263.

“I’m trying to finish the season strong,” Bush said. “I’m trying to grind out my ABs.”

Bush has been a bright spot for the Gauchos, who have struggled a year after playing in the 2016 College World Series. Their top preseason pro prospect — shortstop Clay Fisher — had his season abbreviated to 15 games because of an injury.

Brendan Hornung, in the final appearance of his two-season UH career, set down the first five Gauchos before needing to induce a popout to escape a second-and-third jam in the second inning.

But the Gauchos broke through with five runs in the third. Catcher Dempsey Grover doubled to the wall in right center, advanced to third on second baseman Colton Burns’ single and scored on right fielder Armani Smith’s looping hit to left. Then Bush pulled a towering drive that was so deep right fielder Alex Fitchett did not turn or retreat.

“I was trying to battle and get a pitch to hit,” Bush said. “I wasn’t really seeing it as well as I’d like to. I got to strikes, and I tried to be short and put a good swing on the ball. Getting the (splitter) up in the zone, I hammered it pretty good.”

Two outs later, with Billy Fredrick on first, Kenny Corey hit a drive to left. Left fielder Adam Fogel raced in and misjudged the trajectory as the ball bounced past him to the wall. Fogel retrieved the ball and fired to shortstop Dustin Demeter, whose relay throw to catcher Kekai Rios sabotaged Corey’s attempt at an inside-the-park homer.

“You get down 5-0 in this league you’re going to have a hard time,” UH coach Mike Trapasso said. “We held serve after that, but the damage was done.”

In the fifth, Bush whacked a drive over the 11-foot-high wall in right center to extend the Gauchos’ lead to 6-0.

“The second homer, you can’t go 2-0 (in the count) with a guy with that power, even though he’s leading off (the inning),” Trapasso said.

Trapasso added: “I was disappointed we didn’t play the way we have been playing. We didn’t play with the swagger and arrogance we had most of the year. We need to bring that back.”

The Rainbow Warriors, who had difficulty solving UCSB pitcher Noah Davis’ menu of fastballs and breaking pitches, managed two runs in the fifth to close to 6-2.

Chayce Ka‘aua, making only his sixth start after recovering from a hernia, reached when shortstop JJ Muno bobbled a grounder and then advanced to second when Muno’s throw skipped past Bush at first. One out later, Ka‘aua went to second on Dylan Vchulek’s single to center. Vchulek scooted to second on the unnecessary throw to the plate.

Then Demeter placed an opposite-field single to left, scoring both Ka‘aua and Vchulek. Demeter, a freshman, has a team-high 29 RBIs.

It was a disappointing ending to Hornung’s inspiring UH career. Hornung joined UH in August 2015, two years after he was struck by a line drive that left him in critical condition and required five metal plates to be inserted into his head. Hornung was the ’Bows’ lone returning starting pitcher entering this season. As the opening pitcher for 13 series, Hornung set the tone each week.

But Hornung lasted only five innings on Thursday, relinquishing seven hits and six earned runs on 93 pitches. He walked two. He finished the season with a walks-per-nine-innings average of 1.5.

The teams meet today at 6:35 p.m. in the second game of this three-game series.

BIG WEST BASEBALL

Thursday
>> UC Santa Barbara 7, Hawaii 2
>> Cal Poly 1, UC Riverside 0
>> Cal State Fullerton 6, Long Beach State 3
>> UC Irvine 2, UC Davis 1

Today
>> UC Santa Barbara at Hawaii, 6:30 p.m.
>> UC Riverside at Cal Poly
>> Long Beach State at Cal State Fullerton
>> UC Davis at UC Irvine

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