Gauchos Pile Up 16 Runs to Polish Off Sweep at Tulane

Recap courtesy of UC Santa Barbara, Photo by Tony Mastres

NEW ORLEANS, La. – The UC Santa Barbara baseball team scored four runs before recording a hit, and there would be plenty of hits to come later, capping off an impressive sweep over Tulane with a wild 16-6 rout over the Green Wave on Sunday afternoon at Turchin Stadium.

UCSB (11-2) has now won nine consecutive games, and is off to its best start in five years since the 2014 Gauchos also opened the season 11-2.

Tevin Mitchell hit a grand slam and Tommy Jew hit his fifth home run of the year as the Gauchos returned to their home run hitting ways after being kept inside the ball park in the first two games at Tulane. UCSB is 9-0 when hitting at least one home run in a game this season.

The real story of the game, however, at least early on, was the wild pitching from the Tulane staff that walked eight Gauchos and hit six batters.

Five walks and four hit batsmen occurred in the first two innings alone, helping UCSB take an early 4-0 lead before registering a base hit. The hits would surely come as Mitchell and Andrew Martinez added RBI doubles to highlight a four-run third inning, and the Gauchos were out to an 8-0 lead after three.

Jew hit a solo homer in the fifth and the Green Wave did its best to mount a comeback, scoring a pair of runs in the fourth and fifth to cut the deficit to five, 9-4.

The Gauchos quickly erased all hope for Tulane and sealed the sweep with a six-run seventh inning highlighted by Mitchell's grand slam. After three singles from Jew, Eric Yang and Thomas Rowan loaded the bases again later in the inning, Christian Kirtley drew a walk to bring another run in and Jason Willow came through with a sacrifice fly.

Chris Troye (2-0) picked up the win after tossing four innings and allowing two runs on two hits while striking out five and walking four. Alex Patterson struck out three and gave up two runs in his two innings of relief while Conner Dand (1.2 IP), Jorge Arellano Jr. (0.1 IP) and Shea Barry (1.0 IP) also saw action out of the pen.

Mitchell finished 2-for-3 with six RBIs and three runs on the day while Jew went 2-for-4 with two runs and two RBIs. Armani Smith and Willow also went 2-for-4 and Smith along with Martinez tied Mitchell with a game-high three runs scored.