The University of Hawaii baseball team scored six runs in the 13th inning Sunday and then subdued a UC Santa Barbara rally for a 13-9 victory at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium on the UCSB campus.
The Rainbow Warriors trailed 6-4 entering the top of the ninth. But they cobbled three two-out runs, punctuated with DallasJ Duarte’s two-run single, to take a 7-6 lead.
But the Gauchos hit back-to-back doubles to tie it at 7 and force extra innings.
In the 13th, Jacob Igawa was struck by a pitch, Matt Wong singled, and Naighel Ali ‘i Calderon walked to load the bases. Aaron Ujimori singled through the right side to score Igawa and Wong for a 9-7 lead. Calderon, who advanced to third on the play, was picked off when the Gauchos pulled the hidden-ball trick. But later, Ujimori scored on a wild pitch, Scotty Scott came home on Duarte’s sacrifice fly, and Stone Miyao powered a two-run double.
Miyao finished with four RBIs in going 2 for 7.
Scott, who suffered a shoulder injury on Saturday, was a surprise defensive replacement in the 10th.
The Gauchos came back with two runs in the 13th, and had a runner in scoring position with one out. But Cameron Hagan struck out Broc Mortensen and Jason Willow to end the game.
Hagan, who pitched 4 2 /3 innings of relief, earned the victory to even his record at 1-1.
The ’Bows (9-16, 3-6), who lost the first two of this three-game series, conclude this road trip with a nonconference game against USC on Monday.
UH men swept
Hawaii relied heavily on the left-handed production of Rado Parapunov in building toward a national championship.
Alex Nikolov, a right hander from Parapunov’s hometown in Bulgaria, now owns that role for Long Beach State and helped power the second-ranked Beach to a second straight four-set win over the Rainbow Warriors on Saturday.
Nikolov, a freshman outside hitter from Sofia, Bulgaria, put away 18 kills to lead to the Beach to a 25-23, 25-20, 21-25, 25-19 victory and a series sweep over No. 4 Hawaii at the Walter Pyramid in Long Beach, Calif.
After UH extended the match in the third set, Nikolov posted seven kills, an ace and a solo block in the fourth set as the Beach (16-3, 4-1 ) rallied from a five-point deficit to close out the match and remain alone in first place in the Big West standings.
“He’s an out-of-system attacker and their go-to guy, ” UH coach Charlie Wade said. “As a first-year guy, that’s a nice piece for them to add to that team. He’s certainly doing most of the heavy lifting for them.”
Long Beach State’s pin hitters again carried the bulk of the load for the Beach, accounting for 42 of its 50 total kills. Clarke Godbold and Spencer Olivier complemented Nikolov with 12 kills each in the first regular-season men’s volleyball match to get national television coverage on ESPNU.
Nikolov hit.484 and had 12 digs, two aces and was in on five of LBSU’s season-high 16 blocks and the Beach hit. 350 as a team. Middle blocker Simon Torwie finished with eight blocks and two aces.
UH middle blocker Guilherme Voss posted a career-high 11 kills in 17 attacks and outside hitter Spyros Chakas also had 11. But the Rainbow Warriors hit a collective.174—their second lowest percentage of the season—while falling to 18-5 overall and into fourth place in the Big West at 3-3.
Along with scoring directly with its block, Long Beach State’s touches at the net gave the back row, led by libero Mason Briggs’ 16 digs, a chance to set up opportunities to score in transition.
UH entered the series leading the Big West with a.353 hitting percentage, but committed a season-high 28 attack errors on Saturday and hit.208 in the series.
“Our outside attackers struggled to score tonight, ” Wade said. “That’s something we’re going to look at going forward. They’ve been pretty good, we’ve hit for a pretty high percentage. Hats off to (LBSU ), they had a nice night defensively and we’ve just gotta be a little sharper, a little crisper offensively.”
Setter Jakob Thelle fired four aces to help UH extend the match in the third set and take a five-point lead early in the fourth. He also had four kills and 43 assists and appeared to get up slowly after going to the floor late in the match.
“He’s been a little dinged up all weekend, ” Wade said. “It’s that time of year, nobody’s really 100 %, but certainly a gutty performance from Jakob tonight to just keep pushing himself and really leading our team throughout.”
The Warriors and Beach picked up where they left off Friday – also a four-setter – with another back-and-forth opening set in the rematch.
UH went on a 4-1 run late in the set and led 23-21 on a Cole Hogland kill in the middle. But Long Beach State sent back three consecutive blocks to earn set point and Nikolov’s serve down the line landed in to give the Beach the set.
The second set was tied at 16-16 when LBSU went on a three-point surge with back-to-back aces from Torwie. The Beach held off the Warriors the rest of the way and Nikolov’s tip gave LBSU a 2-0 lead in the match.
With Dimitrios Mouchlias and Filip Humler struggling to score on the right side, Alakai Todd was summoned off the bench and sparked the Warriors with four kills early in the third set. The Beach led 11-9 when UH surged ahead with a 7-1 run with aces from Thelle and Chakas. Thelle added his third ace of the set in a 4-1 run to close out the set and extend the match.
Thelle opened the fourth set with a five-point service run, including his fourth ace of the match. Voss opened the run with a block and hammered two kills in the middle.
Down 9-4, Long Beach State outscored UH 17-6 to take control of the match with Nikolov leading the way.
“That’s just the delicious uncertainty of sport, sometimes the ball doesn’t always bounce your way, ” Wade said. “But I think our guys showed a lot of character and competed against a good team on the road and we’ll be all the better for it.”
UH returns to Manoa for its final home series of the regular season and faces UC Santa Barbara on Friday and Saturday at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
