On an overcast Sunday, Portland’s three-pitcher cast led the way in a 4-0 baseball victory over Hawaii at Les Murakami Stadium.

A crowd of 1,107 saw the Rainbow Warriors manage three hits — none in the first five innings — in losing three of four games in this season-opening series.

Right-hander Chris Clements, a graduate transfer from UC Santa Barbara, pitched six scoreless innings to beat the ’Bows for the first time in his NCAA career. He had a 10.84 earned-run average in two previous starts against UH. But on Sunday, Clements was an auto Pilot. He did not allow a base runner in the first five innings. UH first baseman Alex Baeza broke the drought with a liner that eluded the glove of leaping shortstop Chad Stevens to open the sixth.

Clements exited after six innings, allowing one hit and a walk while striking out eight, including six on called third strikes. Portland relievers Morgan White and Connor Knutson got the final nine outs.

“I thought (Clements) was really good, and I thought we were really bad,” UH coach Mike Trapasso said. “And that’s a bad combination.”

Portland catcher Dutton Elske said Clements used his entire menu of pitches.

“Chris had everything going,” Elske said. “His fastball command was really down in the zone. His changeup, he was throwing it really well to his arm side. And he kept them off balance. His slider was definitely a plus pitch. The combination of the three, and you mix in a curveball here and there, and it’s really hard to get a hold of.”

Clements said he followed the game plan.

“I just kept the ball down,” Clements said. “You make a mistake, and these guys will get after it. I kept the ball down, and trusted Dutton and (pitching) coach (Connor) Lambert and what they were calling, and it went well.”

It took two at-bats for the Pilots to take a 1-0 lead. Second baseman Matt Kelly drove a Kash Koltermann pitch over the wall in center field in the first inning.

Elske doubled home two runs in the second and hit an RBI double in the fourth for a 4-0 lead. Koltermann, who lasted four innings, was charged with all four runs.

“Kash was bad from the start,” Trapasso said. “He was up in the zone. And his fastball command wasn’t there. His changeup was solid, which is his pitch, but it all starts with fastball command. And a lot of their hits were on fastballs he just missed. He just had a bad outing. I feel bad for Kash because he’s a senior, and he’s not scared out there. He’s going to battle. But he just wasn’t good today.”

Right-hander Li‘i Pontes did not allow a run in five innings of relief. Trapasso praised the weekend performances of UH’s three freshman pitchers — Pontes, Cade Halemanu and Aaron Davenport.

“We really hit the nail on the head with our freshmen this series,” Trapasso said of a group that included catcher/infielder Dallas Duarte and left fielder Scotty Scott. “That didn’t surprise us. What surprised us was some of our returning guys didn’t have the (same) weekend as our freshmen.”

On Sunday, the second through fourth spots in the lineup were one of 12. For the series, those three spots hit a combined .137 (seven of 51).

“We’ve got to get the middle of our order swinging better,” Trapasso said. “That was kind of the story of this weekend. Two, three, four particularly struggled. Those guys hit in the middle of of the order because they’re good hitters. We won’t expect (to struggle) again next weekend.”