Needing two wins to clinch fourth and final playoff spot, Nevada does just that at New Mexico and will play Lobos again Thursday in first round of Mountain West Tournament
The Wolf Pack was unable to hang onto an early 5-2 lead at New Mexico on Saturday and missed out on a sweep of the Lobos with
a 13-6 loss.
New Mexico (29-25-1, 19-9-1) scored seven times in the seventh to snap a five-game losing streak in Mountain West play and clinched the conference regular-season title. Nevada (19-34, 13-16) grabbed the No. 4 seed one day prior with a 17-9 win.
New Mexico will host the Mountain West Tournament starting Thursday and will see Nevada for a fourth-straight game. The winner of that one will play the winner of No. 2 San Diego State and No. 3 Fresno State.
Nevada actually outhit New Mexico, 16-13, but issued 10 walks.
Nevada 17, New Mexico 9
Nevada clinched the fourth and final spot in next weekend’s Mountain West Tournament with a 17-9 win at New Mexico on Friday night in a game that lasted four hours and 18 minutes.
After jumping out to a 12-3 lead, the Wolf Pack saw the advantage trimmed to 12-9, then scored five unanswered to secure a postseason berth.
The Pack set season highs with 17 runs, 17 hits, 14 RBIs, 27 total bases, five stolen bases and tied the season high with 44 at bats. Individually, right fielder Michael Echavia was perfect at the plate going 5-for-5 and set team highs with five runs scored, five hits, seven RBIs and 10 total bases.
Reed product Mark Nowaczewski will not win his fourth Mountain West Pitcher of the Week honor, but did win his team-leading sixth game of the season and his third straight.
He went 5.1 innings, allowing eight runs on eight hits.
Grant Ford (1.1 innings, two hits) and Evan McMahan (2 innings, one hit) held the Lobos off the scoreboard the final 3.1 innings. It was McMahan’s 89th career appearance, one shy of the program record.
Nevada 5, New Mexico 2
Senior Trevor Charpie pitched his first complete game of the season as Nevada topped New Mexico 5-2 at Santa Ana Star Field on Thursday night. It was Charpie’s third career complete game as he won for the third time this season.
The Lobos scored both their runs in the home half of the first on three hits.
Charpie (3-6) ended allowing just the two runs on five hits and struck out five in the game to earn the victory. Over the final six innings, he allowed just one hit and one walk for a total of two base runners.
In the top of the third, Nevada sent eight batters to the plate and three scored to take a 3-2 lead. The inning started with consecutive singles from Jordan Pearce, Grant Fennell and Echavia to load the bases. A balk by Tyler Stevens scored Pearce while the other two runners moved into scoring position for Chase Grant who delivered a two RBI single to put the Pack up to stay.
In the fifth, Grant hit a two-out triple to right center field and scored on Cole Krzmarzick’s infield single and it was two-run cushion for the Wolf Pack, 4-2. Nevada’s final run came in the seventh when Echavia singled and scored with two down on Krzmarzick’s double down the right field line to make the final score 5-2.
Leave a Reply