June 16, 2007

UC Irvine falls in College World Series opener
Nerves appear to affect UCI, which falls, 5-4, to Arizona State in its debut.
BY JANIS CARR
The Orange County Register

OMAHA, Neb. It wasn't Arizona State's three home runs or nine hits that spoiled UC Irvine's College World Series debut.

Nor was it necessarily the Sun Devils' pitching that led to the Anteaters' 5-4 loss Saturday, or Ike Davis' winning home run. What hurt fourth-ranked Irvine the most was something the Anteaters hadn't expected.

Nerves.

The emotion of playing in front of 19,638 on the biggest stage in college baseball worked its way into the Anteaters' psyche, pitching and offense and left them wishing for a do-over and a few more games.

The Anteaters (45-16-1) now sit on the brink of elimination. They will play Cal State Fullerton at 11 a.m. PDT Monday in the losers' bracket, with the winner staying and the loser heading home.

“That was a great college baseball game that we just came out on the short end of the stick,” Irvine coach Dave Serrano said. “There have been many teams that have come here and in Game 1 they played out of character. I'm not embarrassed about (our performance). We had a chance to win that game, but we were playing a very formidable opponent, a very good opponent.

“Like I told the team, if we all had a chance to do something different, we would have, including me. We can't put our heads down. That was a great college baseball game.”

The Anteaters' reaction to the moment was somewhat surprising considering they had gone into Texas and eliminated the venerable Longhorns in the NCAA regionals. Then they headed to Wichita State and silenced more than 8,000 hostile fans with a two-game sweep of the Shockers to earn their first World Series berth.

Their nerves should have been settled by the time they reached Omaha. Instead, the Sun Devils added to their jitters by jumping on Irvine ace Scott Gorgen (12-3) for an early 3-0 lead. Matt Spencer (2 for 3) blasted a towering three-run shot into the right-field seats in the second inning for his ninth homer of the season.

“He (pitched) a little out of character,” Serrano said of Gorgen, a sophomore right-hander. “He said to me in the fourth inning he was having a tough time breathing and getting relaxed. There's a lot of excitement being out there playing in Rosenblatt Stadium.

“He didn't have this best stuff, but he kept a great offensive-hitting team to five runs.”

While Gorgen was getting settled, the rest of the team got moving and put the Anteaters ahead with a four-run fourth.

With one out and Cody Cipriano on first after being hit by a pitch, Matt Morris singled through the right side to move Cipriano to third. Byran Petersen then drove in two runs with a triple to left-center to trim the deficit to 3-2.

Freshman designated hitter Sean Madigan doubled in the tying run with an opposite-field drive into the left-field corner, then scored to give the Anteaters a 4-3 lead on Ollie Linton's ground single to right field.

At that point, the Anteaters appeared poised to become the first team since Georgia Tech in 1994 to win their CWS debut. Arizona State had other ideas.

C.J. Retherford hit a tying homer in the fifth, and Davis belted his eighth home run of the season in the eighth to put the Sun Devils on top.

After the fourth, Sun Devils starter Mike Leake and closer Jason Jarvis combined to hold the Anteaters hitless the rest of the way, allowing only two base runners on a hit batter and walk.

“I don't know if we're executing,” Arizona State coach Pat Murphy said. “We're getting better. We're starting to believe more and more. C.J puts a big lift into our lineup.”