Hawaii baseball coach Rich Hill went with a committee approach on the mound Sunday against CSU Bakersfield, and it worked all the way until the end.
Matt Kurata’s one-out, bases-loaded single to right-center field off Harrison Bodendorf scored Noah Alvarez with the winning run in the ninth as CSU Bakersfield beat Hawaii 3-2 in Bakersfield, Calif.
The Roadrunners tied it earlier in the inning on Jonah Shields’ double just inside the right-field line, which scored Kyler Stancato.
On Saturday, Bodendorf pitched 21⁄3 scoreless innings and threw 32 pitches in Hawaii’s 11-7 victory for his first save of the season. He was Hawaii’s fifth pitcher Sunday.
“Bodey will never make excuses,” Hill said. “He touched 88 (mph) on the gun so he was feeling pretty good. Guys pitching from that (three-quarters) arm slot can bounce back really quickly.”
The Rainbow Warriors (12-7, 2-1 Big West) won the first two games of the series.
Hawaii manufactured both its runs in the third inning.
Ben Zeigler-Namoa reached on a fielding error by the second baseman. Jake Tsukada singled to center and advanced to second on an unsuccessful attempt to throw out Zeigler-Namoa at third. Jordan Donahue’s ground out to second plated Zeigler-Namoa and advanced Tsukada to third. Elijah Ickes’ sacrifice fly to center scored Tsukada. Both runs were unearned.
“That was great to see,” Hill said. “That was a bug-a-boo for us this season. It was nice to see Jordan hit the ground ball up the middle for a run and Elijah with the sacrifice fly.”
Hill added the key to the rally was Zeigler-Namoa going from first to third on Tsukada’s hit.
Nainoa Cardinez started and went one inning for the Rainbow Warriors. Connor Harrison followed with three innings, Tyler Dyball pitched 12⁄3, Itsuki Takemoto worked 22⁄3 and Bodendorf (0-3) didn’t retired any of the four batters he faced.
Takemoto, who has four saves, entered after Zavien Watson’s two-out single off Dyball in the sixth.
Takemoto allowed two hits with no walks and one strikeout, and threw 40 pitches. He hit two batters in the seventh.
Takemoto was pulled after allowing a one-out double to pinch hitter Brock Perreira.
Bodendorf entered and allowed a four-pitch walk to Alvarez, Shields’ RBI double, an intentional walk to Cody Hendriks to load the bases and Kurata’s walk-off hit.
“(Takemoto) got one out in the ninth and he fell behind 3-0 to the lefty. That’s when they hit the double,” Hill said. “They pinch hit a lefty. Bodey was ready to go and I wanted to go left-on-left.”
The Roadrunners (4-16, 1-2) got within 2-1 in the fifth on Shields’ run-scoring single.
Hawaii had a couple of chances to add to its lead.
The Rainbow Warriors had the first two batters reach in the fifth, but came up empty.
In the sixth, Matthew Miura singled, stole second and third. He was thrown out at the plate when DallasJ Duarte missed a squeeze bunt sign and took ball four on the pitch.
“That was a squeeze bunt. I don’t know what happened,” Hill said. “I haven’t talked to Dallas yet, but he didn’t offer at it.”
Gary Grosjean (1-2) picked up the victory with three scoreless innings of relief.
Hawaii will return home for a nonconference, three-game series against San Diego State, which starts Friday.
BIG WEST BASEBALL
Conference Overall
W L Pct. GB W L
UCSB 3 0 1.000 — 12 5
UC Irvine 2 1 .667 1 15 3
UCSD 2 1 .667 1 15 4
Hawaii 2 1 .667 1 12 7
Cal Poly 2 1 .667 1 10 9
UC Riverside 0 0 .000 11
2 9 9
CS Northridge 1 2 .333 2 10 9
UC Davis 1 2 .333 2 10 9
CS Fullerton 1 2 .333 2 8 10
CS Bakersfield 1 2 .333 2 4 16
LBSU 0 3 .000 3 10 7
Sunday
CS Northridge 10, Cal Poly 8
UC San Diego 4, Cal State Fullerton 2
Cal State Bakersfield 3, Hawaii 2
UC Davis12, UC Irvine 10
UC Santa Barbara 7, Long Beach State 4
CSU BAKERSFIELD 3, HAWAII 2
RAINBOW WARRIORS AB R H BI BB SO
J. Donahue ss 5 0 1 1 0 2
Ickes 3b 3 0 0 1 0 3
Machado dh 4 0 1 0 0 0
Miura cf 4 0 1 0 0 0
Duarte c 2 0 1 0 2 0
Miyao 2b 4 0 0 0 0 1
Rimmer rf 3 0 1 0 0 1
Calderon rf 0 0 0 0 0 0
K. Donahue ph 1 0 0 0 0 0
Nahaku lf 0 0 0 0 0 0
Zeigler-Namoa 1b 3 1 1 0 1 0
Tsukada lf 3 1 2 0 1 0
Quandt pr/rf 0 0 0 0 0 0
TOTALS 32 2 8 2 4 7
ROADRUNNERS AB R H BI BB SO
Shields rf 4 0 2 2 0 2
Hendriks lf 4 0 2 0 1 0
Kurata c 5 0 2 1 0 0
Gutierrez 1b 4 0 2 0 0 0
BujandaMcCon pr 0 0 0 0 0 0
Silva 1b 0 0 0 0 0 0
Watson dh 4 0 1 0 0 1
Pollard cf 4 0 0 0 0 0
Leon 3b 3 0 0 0 0 0
Gerecke ph 1 0 0 0 0 0
Salas 2b 2 1 1 0 0 0
Perreira ph 1 0 1 0 0 0
Stancato pr 0 1 0 0 0 0
Pelayo ss 2 0 0 0 0 1
Alvarez ph 0 1 0 0 1 0
TOTALS 34 3 11 3 2 4
Hawaii (12-7, 2-1) 002 000 000 — 2 8 0
CSUB (4-16, 1-2) 000 010 002 — 3 11 1
E–Salas. DP–Hawaii 1; CSUB 2. LOB–
Hawaii 8; CSUB 11. 2B–Shields, Perreira.
HBP–Shields, Salas. SH–Pelayo. SF–
Ickes. SB–Miura, Duarte. CS–Miura.
HAWAII IP H R ER BB SO
Cardinez 1 2 0 0 0 2
Harrison 3 2 0 0 0 1
Dyball 12
3 3 1 1 0 0
Takemoto 22
3 2 1 1 0 1
Bodendorf (L, 0-3) 0 2 1 1 2 0
CSU BAKERSFIELD IP H R ER BB SO
O’Connor 6 5 2 0 2 5
Grosjean (W, 1-2) 3 3 0 0 2 2
WP–O’Connor. HBP–by Takemoto
(Salas); by Takemoto (Shields). Umpires—
(Plate): Jason Rogers. (First): Joseph Gonzalez. (Second): Christopher Torres.
(Third): Michael Chukerman. T—2:45.
A–401.
