An offensive display from San Diego dropped BYU baseball, 9-5, on a windy Saturday at Larry H. Miller Field.
"They got hits off good pitching; we didn't," BYU head coach Mike Littlewood said. "I think they got three two-out RBIs and I don't think we got any. We didn't get the big hits."
The Toreros (20-24, 9-12 West Coast Conference) knocked 13 hits, including six extra-base hits, to take the series-deciding finale against the Cougars (19-19, 8-10 WCC).
BYU drew first blood in the second inning, with Noah Hill’s two-run double to right field. The San Diego right fielder initially came in and then retreated as the ball fell in behind him. Nate Favero and Casey Jacobsen, who reached on singles, came around for the 2-0 lead.
Jay Schuyler got San Diego on the board in the third with a double down the left-field line. In the fourth, the Toreros evened the score on Kevin Collard’s RBI double. They took a 3-2 lead when Cougar fielders lost a ball in the sun and it fell in by the left-field line for a double.
San Diego scored two more in the fifth after BYU pitchers walked the bases loaded. A single up the middle off the bat of Adam Kerner made it 5-2 for the Toreros.
Kyle Dean blasted a two-run homer in the bottom half of the fifth that landed in the street in front of the Marriott Center steps.
With a sacrifice fly off the bat of Schuyler, San Diego went up 6-4 in the seventh. After the stretch, Keaton Kringlen skied a sacrifice fly for BYU to score Daniel Schneemann and bring the Cougar deficit back to one run.
A Torero double and single kept BYU at arm’s length, once again, as San Diego scored one in the eighth and led 7-5. The Toreros added two more in the ninth when Brhet Bewley smashed a two-run over the left-field fence.
The Cougars play at Cal on Tuesday before a series at Saint Mary’s beginning on Thursday.