No. 7 Stanford takes three of four games from No. 23 Texas baseball

By Steve Habel/Senior Contributing Writer

AUSTIN, Texas — If the Texas baseball team uses its annual series with Stanford as a measuring stick for its progress and as a tool to determine how good it will be once the Big 12 Conference season begins, the Longhorns found out they have a long way to go after losing three of four games to the seventh-ranked Cardinal this weekend at UFCU Disch-Falk Field.

Texas captured Thursday’s first game of the four-games-in-four-days series, 8-6, and then got shellacked in the final three, losing 7-1 Friday, 9-3 Saturday and 11-1 Sunday.

For those scoring at home, Stanford outscored the 23rd-ranked Longhorns, 33-13, in the series and never [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]trailed in the final three games, dominating the action.

“Rough weekend — really tough day (Saturday),” Texas coach David Pierce said. “I was expecting a little better in our fight to get back to even this weekend. Our guys need to regroup. Get back to trusting themselves and believing in themselves and understand that we just played one of the better teams in the country. We have to learn from them and take it personal.”

The Longhorns, who fell to 9-7 on the season, got the series off on the right foot Thursday, scoring a run in each of the first five innings before capping the win with a three-run seventh. Austin Todd’s pinch-hit two-run double was the key hit in the seventh and derailed Stanford’s comeback attempt. Todd has missed the past three weeks with a thumb injury.

“I’ve been itching to play the past couple of weeks,” Todd said. “I’ve just been on the edge of my seat taking everything in and learning from the game. I knew that I was starting to get better and I just had to be ready whenever Coach (Pierce) called on me.

“I don’t know if it’ll ever be quite 100 percent. I’m going to keep playing on it because it’s a long season but it’s just something you have to grind through.”

Kacy Clemens, Zach Zubia, Ryan Reynolds and D.J. Petrinsky each had two hits in the Longhorns’ 12-hit attack, with Clemens ripping his fourth home run of the season and Reynolds scoring two runs.

Bryce Elder, the third Texas pitcher, earned the victory with 1 1/3 innings of one-run, two-hit pitching. Chase Shugart got his first save of the season by getting the final six outs and surrendering one run.

“I just see them growing and understanding that we play the entire game,” Pierce said. “The key was to continue to have quality at-bats. For these guys to finish it off and get the win was big for us going into the rest of the weekend.”

Whatever resolve the Longhorns found in their win Thursday disappeared overnight, as the Cardinal rolled to an easy win on Friday. Stanford scored five runs off 10 hits against Texas ace starter Nolan Kingham (2-2) and rode the three-hit pitching of its own ace, Kris Bubic, (3-0) to the victory.

The Longhorns managed just six hits — two by David Hamilton — and Duke Ellis plated Texas’ only run with an RBI groundout.

The Cardinal’s momentum from Friday night’s victory carried them to another runaway win Saturday afternoon. Stanford tallied five runs in the first two innings off Texas starter Blair Henley (2-1) and that was plenty of cushion for the Cardinal’s Erik Miller (4-1), a lefthander whose fastball reached 97 miles per hour.

After falling behind, 5-0, the Longhorns cut Stanford’s lead to two runs via Zubia’s three-run home run. Stanford put away the game with four runs in the ninth off Longhorns relievers Josh Sawyer and Beau Ridgeway.

Texas recorded seven hits in the loss and left seven runners on base.

“We just didn’t play well enough to win against a very quality team, especially on the mound,” Pierce said. “We have to quit giving them things. We put ourselves in a position to have a shot in the middle of the game.

Texas had just two hits in the series finale, one each from Masen Hibbeler and Ellis, and didn’t score until the bottom of the eighth inning, when UT was already down 10-0.

Stanford set the tone early with three runs in the first off of Shugart and expanded its lead to 9-0 with six runs in the sixth inning. Andrew Daschbach hit a three-run homerun off Shugart in the first inning and the Cardinal never looked back.

One of the worst things that came out of the Stanford series was a shoulder injury to sparkplug shortstop Hamilton, who was pulled from the Saturday’s game and played Sunday but did not reach base.

Texas returns to the field Tuesday when it plays the first of two games at No. 5 Arkansas before returning home to play Kansas Friday in its Big 12 opener.

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