The Southern California College Baseball Classic kicked off this weekend at Dedeaux Field with USC defeating No. 22 TCU 2-1 Friday evening and No. 2 Vanderbilt 2-1 Saturday afternoon. The Trojans picked up a loss to No. 6 UCLA 15-3 Sunday afternoon.
USC honored the Trojans' 1970 NCAA Championship team this weekend, marking the 50th anniversary of the program’s sixth College World Series title-winning team.
The caliber of Trojan pitching remained in full effect in their two victories. Junior right-handed pitcher Kyle Hurt pitched six innings against the Horned Frogs, allowing only one run on three hits and marking a season-high nine K’s. Hurt is currently the No. 93 prospect in the 2020 MLB draft.
“I try to always have the same mentality, it’s kind of just like ‘F you, I’m going to get you out every single time,’” Hurt said. “And just take deep breaths and just throwing with as much intent as I can just to get the guy out,” Hurt said.
Despite Hurt’s remarkable game, he still looks to improve himself.
“There are some things that I could have worked on today, like I didn't throw a lot of off-speed pitches today,” he said. “So that's something I'm going to go into next week focusing on and just getting a better feel for all my pitches and so next weekend, when we come out here I'll be better at that.”
Hurt’s relief pitchers, freshman right-handed pitcher Ethan Hoopingarner and graduate right-handed pitcher Ben Wanger, dominated against TCU. Hoopingarner threw two no-hit innings while Wanger closed the game with a scoreless ninth.
“We went after their best hitters and you know I talked about our pitching before the season started. I think it has a chance to be special,” head coach Jason Gill said. “Kyle is a top-two round talent, you know he’s throwing the ball up to 96 miles an hour with an excellent changeup and a good breaking ball.”
The pitching was supported by hitting from junior infielders Jamal O'Guinn and Ben Ramirez. O’Guinn went 3-for-3 at the plate with an RBI and a walk, while Ramirez posted the game-winning RBI with a single in the third.
The unranked Trojans came in as underdogs but didn’t allow that to faze them.
“I think this whole tournament's loaded with a lot of talent,” Gill said. “Two teams in the top 10 and one of the top 25, so I think our goal this weekend is to try to earn a little respect and just play quality baseball. I thought we did that tonight.”
The Trojans continued to bring the heat on the mound against Vanderbilt, although it wasn’t a great start.
Commodores sophomore centerfielder Tate Kolwyck silenced the Trojan crowd by crushing a home run off of junior left-handed pitcher John Beller’s first pitch. However, Beller remained collected, going eight innings with only two hits and the one run allowed while striking out seven batters.
“All preseason all we've thought about is no matter what happens on the first pitch, whether it's the first pitch of the game or first pitch of the batter. So what? Get to the next one,” Beller said.
Near the end of the game, Gill made his way to the mound, demonstrating his faith in Beller by offering him a choice.
“[Coach Gill] came out in the eighth inning and he said ‘This is your game if you want it, there's no reason I'm going to take you out of this ballgame,’” Beller said. “I just want to come out here and give you a breather and wait for the umpire to come break us up.’”
Beller showed stellar pitching against the College World Series defending champions up until the eighth inning; however, his pitch count was at 81.
“Sometimes when a guy has that much control of the game in terms of giving up two hits over eight innings, you don't want to interject the other offense with another pitcher where they might be like ‘Ooh, thank goodness he's out of the game,’” Gill said. “So we wanted to keep him in, but it was with the short leash so when that first guy reached base we opted to go to our closer, Ben Wanger.”
Wanger got a sacrifice bunt, groundout and strikeout to pick up his third save of the year. He has yet to give up an earned run in 6.1 innings pitched out of the bullpen this year.
The Trojans battled at the plate with Ramirez going 3-for-3 with an RBI, a double and a walk that tied the game in the third inning.
With the bases loaded in the bottom of the seventh inning, sophomore first baseman Clay Owens fought his way to a full-count ending in a single that drove in the game-winning run.
“All we try to do every time we go out there is just to earn some respect,” Beller said. “You know, we get disrespected every year here at USC, and we're just trying to go out there and push people along this year.”
Coming off of two wins, Gill was already preparing for Sunday’s crosstown rivalry.
“Oh, you know, we'll watch film, and we'll do what we usually do, we'll try to stay in our routine,” he said. “At the end of the day, it's gonna be about whether you're playing Trojan baseball or not, and if we're doing the things that we work on every day, we're gonna have a chance to win.”
Unfortunately, the high caliber of Trojan pitching was absent as the Trojans gave up 19 hits and 15 runs. Unable to find their rhythm, the Trojans put six different pitchers on the mound in an effort to tame the Bruins.
Pitching wasn’t the only thing that was awry: Over the course of the game the Trojans struggled to control ground balls, resulting in five errors throughout the game.
The Trojans look to bounce back when they host Xavier Tuesday at 6 p.m.