Keenan Donath
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On Friday night, the No. 5 Cal Poly baseball team took on Big West Conference-leading UC Irvine in what figures to be the most important series of the year for the Mustangs. But it was the Anteaters (34-14, 15-1 Big West) who continued their streak of good play and picked up their ninth straight win with a 3-2 victory over Cal Poly (39-10, 14-5 Big West) at Baggett Stadium.
The Mustangs were able to keep it close thanks to a dominant pitching performance from junior southpaw Matt Imhof, but it proved not to be enough in a matchup of the conference’s top two teams.
UC Irvine was led by starting pitcher Andrew Morales, who limited Cal Poly’s offense to only five hits and two runs over his eight innings of work. The right-hander had nine strikeouts and pushed his record to 9-0 on the season while raising his ERA to 1.02. He’s now 19-0 in his career at UC Irvine.
“With a good pitcher like that, you just have to keep to your approach,” junior right fielder Nick Torres said. “You can’t let him dictate the game. He likes to work quickly so we tried to slow him down a little bit.”
Imhof (8-4) did his best to keep up. He allowed three UC Irvine hits and two earned runs over eight innings, and struck out thirteen.
“My fastball felt really good, it was downhill,” Imhof said. “I was able to go to both sides of the plate with it. Slider felt good. I was just able to get ahead early and put them away.”
Two third-inning runs from sophomore second baseman Mark Mathias’ RBI single and junior center fielder Jordan Ellis’ safety squeeze weren’t enough to hold the Anteaters off. A two-run fifth inning, headlined by an RBI single from UC Irvine left fielder Grant Palmer and a sac fly from shortstop Chris Rabago were just enough for the Anteaters to steal a win.
“We have been resilient all year, we just have to have a short memory,” head coach Larry Lee said. “Can’t do anything about tonight.”
Torres led Cal Poly on offense as he collected two hits, while junior left fielder Zack Zehner managed a double.
First pitch for the second game of the series is set for Saturday at 6 p.m.