OGDEN — For an inning or two, anyhow, the University of Utah was getting the best of San Diego State pitching ace Stephen Strasburg — again.
The only team to defeat the projected No. 1 pick in next month's Major League Baseball draft twice in his collegiate career jumped out to an early advantage Thursday night at Lindquist Field.
Things eventually changed, however, and Strasburg wound up raising his record to 12-0 as SDSU rallied for an 11-2 victory in the opener of a three-game series to complete regular season play in the Mountain West Conference.
"I thought our club batted great for six innings tonight and did probably as good of a job against Stephen as any team can," said Utah coach Bill Kinneberg, who noted that the Utes tried to limit his strikeouts and put the ball in play.
Strasburg was effective, but not overly impressive — at least by his standards. The right-hander, who was clocked at 99 miles per hour by scouts in attendance, gave up six hits in his encore to a no-hitter against Air Force on May 5. He threw 116 pitches (81 for strikes) over seven complete innings, finishing with 10 strikeouts and giving up just one walk.
"I don't think he had his best stuff but he pitched and that's the thing," said SDSU coach Tony Gywnn, who added that Strasburg eventually settled in and found the strike zone. "But he still managed the game and kept us in position where we could come back and win the game."
The Utes got to Strasburg quickly and took a 2-0 lead in the first inning. Corey Shimada led off with a walk and later scored on an RBI triple by Nick Kuroczko. The one-out hit down the first base line produced the first earned run Strasburg had given up in 17 2/3 innings.
Utah's next batter, C.J. Cron, followed with an RBI single to double the Utes' lead.
It wasn't enough, though, to rattle the pitcher.
"I wasn't really stressed about it or panicking at all. I knew that we were going to score runs," Strasburg said. "But I definitely needed to sharpen my game up and make some quality pitches from there on."
Trailing 2-0, SDSU retaliated with single scores in the third and fourth innings. The first came on a run-scoring double by Jomel Torres and the second off an RBI groundout from Brandon Decker.
The Aztecs pulled ahead in the fifth on Erik Castro's two-out, two-run homer to left. The blast made it 4-2 and determined the outcome.
Strasburg is so good, Kinneberg noted, that the Utes could have used a few more runs.
Instead it was the Aztecs who put more scores on the board. They added seven more runs by game's end.
"It was a good night. It was good to be able to keep the team in the ball game," Strasburg said. "I knew we were going to add up a lot of runs today."
The series continues Friday night at 6 in Ogden. Utah RHP Andrew Wilding (1-5, 6.46 ERA) and SDSU RHP Ryan O'Sullivan (4-2, 5.44 ERA) are the scheduled starters.
On Saturday, the Utes will pit RHP Jordan Whatcott (4-2, 4.02 ERA) against RHP Tyler Lavigne (6-1, 3.62 ERA) of the Aztecs. The series finale is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m.
GAMES NOTES: The projected attendance was 1,685 ... A scheduling conflict with the Salt Lake Bees at Spring Mobile Ballpark led to the series being moved to Ogden ... Cron, a freshman, acknowledged it was "pretty cool" to get three hits off a future major leaguer ... SDSU can pass BYU for the No. 2 seed in the upcoming MWC tournament with a sweep. A big deal considering the top two teams receive a first-round bye.
E-mail: dirk@desnews.com