UH-Hilo’s baseball team put itself in a whole earlier this season with an unfortunate three-game stretch at Hawaii Pacific in which the Vulcans surrendered 53 runs.
They were back on Oahu on Friday night, and with a potent lineup and shored-up pitching, UHH completed the digging-out process, beating the Sharks 11-6 in Waipahu to get back to .500.
Oahu natives Kobie Russell and Jaryn Kanbara each collected three hits, Dylan Spain pitched six innings and Brandyn Lee-Lehano worked three scoreless.
The Vuls (15-15, 13-10 Pacific West Conference) went ahead for good with a four-run fourth inning fueled by Mana Manago’s leadoff triple and RBI singles off the bats of Rustin Ho and Dylan Sugimoto, going ahead 8-4.
Spain (3-1) struck out four in a 95-pitch outing at Hans L’Orange Park, allowing eight hits – five came in the first two innings – and five runs, two earned.
While the Vuls made two errors, the Sharks (19-16, 6-13) committed four, leading to five unearned runs being charged to their five pitchers.
In his 17th appearance of the season, Lee-Lehano nailed down his third save, yielding two hits and two walks with four strikeouts.
UHH belted 14 hits.
Russell got the Vuls going with double in the first, and his run-scoring single in the eighth made it 10-5. An inning earlier, Kanbara came up with a two-out single to score Russell. Casey Yamauchi’s triple down the right field line in the second scored Ho, who had reached on hit and finished 2 for 4.
Manago had two extra-base hits, and Kamalu Neal drove in two runs.
The teams play a 1 p.m. doubleheader Saturday, with the second game being nonconference.