Friday, March 18
Houston, Texas
6:30 PM
Rice University
6-13, 0
8
vs
7
UAB
11-4, 0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
R
H
E
UAB
0
0
0
0
0
0
6
1
0
7
10
2
Rice
3
0
1
0
0
0
4
0
X
8
7
5
Two-out Rally Sparks Owls in Opener
3/18/2022 11:40:00 PM | Baseball
Game Two set for 2 p.m. Saturday
In Brief: Pierce Gallo capped a four-run, two-out rally in the seventh with a two-run single, and Matthew Linskey closed the door on any additional scoring by striking out four of five batters he faced as Rice downed UAB 8-7 at Reckling Park on Friday night.
The Details: The first six innings of the game bore little resemblance to how the final three innings would play out. Rice starter Cooper Chandler put together his strongest outing at an Owl, holding the Blazers off the scoreboard for six innings while striking out a season-high seven. After scoring just one run for Chandler in his first four starts, the Owls' offense gave him an immediate cushion. With one out in the first, Austin Bulman and Aaron Smigelski homered on consecutive pitches to give Chandler a 3-0 lead. Smigelski's blast to center was measured at 444 feet, the longest by an Owl this season. He added another homer in his next at-bat in the third inning and combined with his home run against SFA on Tuesday night, the freshman from Clayton, NC had homered in three consecutive trips to the plate. Leading 4-0 heading the seventh, the Owls saw UAB strike for six unearned runs in the top half of the inning and then responded with four of their own. Garibay singled between a pair of strikeouts and the Owls followed with four consecutive walks, tying the game on RBI walks by Jack Riedel and Connor Walsh. Gallo then followed by singling over second base on the first pitch to put the Owls ahead to stay. Linskey came on with one run in and the tying run at second. He needed seven pitches to fan UAB's Logan Braunshweig and then caught Caleb Floyd looking to end that threat. He came back to pitch into a second inning for the first time in his career and walked a pair around a strikeout. But he fanned Darryl Buggs to get the second out and coaxed a fly ball to center to retire John Marc Mullins and give the Owls their third consecutive win.
Notable:
The Details: The first six innings of the game bore little resemblance to how the final three innings would play out. Rice starter Cooper Chandler put together his strongest outing at an Owl, holding the Blazers off the scoreboard for six innings while striking out a season-high seven. After scoring just one run for Chandler in his first four starts, the Owls' offense gave him an immediate cushion. With one out in the first, Austin Bulman and Aaron Smigelski homered on consecutive pitches to give Chandler a 3-0 lead. Smigelski's blast to center was measured at 444 feet, the longest by an Owl this season. He added another homer in his next at-bat in the third inning and combined with his home run against SFA on Tuesday night, the freshman from Clayton, NC had homered in three consecutive trips to the plate. Leading 4-0 heading the seventh, the Owls saw UAB strike for six unearned runs in the top half of the inning and then responded with four of their own. Garibay singled between a pair of strikeouts and the Owls followed with four consecutive walks, tying the game on RBI walks by Jack Riedel and Connor Walsh. Gallo then followed by singling over second base on the first pitch to put the Owls ahead to stay. Linskey came on with one run in and the tying run at second. He needed seven pitches to fan UAB's Logan Braunshweig and then caught Caleb Floyd looking to end that threat. He came back to pitch into a second inning for the first time in his career and walked a pair around a strikeout. But he fanned Darryl Buggs to get the second out and coaxed a fly ball to center to retire John Marc Mullins and give the Owls their third consecutive win.
Notable:
- Rice snapped a four-game losing streak in conference season openers, winning for the first time since they defeated UTSA in San Antonio 9-4 to open the 2015 conference schedule.
- The three-game winning streak for the Owls is their longest since they won three straight from May 11-14, 2019 (Southern Miss-2 & Houston). The last time Rice has won more than three straight was from April 18-28, 2019 when then win six in a row with sweeps of Middle Tennessee and Louisiana Tech.
- The Owls scored three in the first and four in the seventh and have eight innings in which they have scored three or more runs over the last 24 innings after having only six such innings in the first 16 games.
- On the mound, six Rice pitchers combined to strikeout 13 UAB hitters, the sixth time in the last seven games they have reached double digits. Over their last 72 innings, the staff has fanned 86 batters.
- Gallo has driven in a run in four consecutive games (8 total).
- Smigelski has hit in 12 of his first 13 games as a collegian and is hitting .373 with four homers and 15 RBI.
- Garibay was 1x4 and scored twice. He has gone 9x15 during the Owls' three-game winning streak and has scored seven runs.
- Nathan Becker drew the second of the Owls four consecutive walks in the seventh inning and has now reached base in 14 consecutive games, matching the longest streak by the Owls in 2021 (Cade Edwards).
- The fly ball to end the game snapped a streak of 17 consecutive outs by strikeout for Linskey, who picked up his third save while working a career-best 1.2 innings. He has 19 strikeouts in 7.2 innings this year.
Team Stats
Pitching:
W: DeLeon, Alex (2-1)
L: Carson Myers (2-2)
S: Linskey, Matthew (3)
Batting:
2B: John Marc Mullins 1 ; Josh Sears 1
RBI: Matthew Golda 1 ; Josh Sears 1 ; Caleb Floyd 2 ; Brandon Willoughby 2
Base Running:
RUNS: John Marc Mullins 1 ; Matthew Golda 1 ; Logan Braunschweig 1 ; Caleb Floyd 1 ; Joseph Kiel 1 ; Tyler Waugh 1 ; Darryl Buggs 1
SB: Matthew Golda 1
HBP: John Marc Mullins 1 ; Josh Sears 1
Batting:
HR: Bulman, Austin 1 ; Smigelski, Aaron 2
RBI: Bulman, Austin 2 ; Smigelski, Aaron 2 ; Riedel, Jack 1 ; Walsh, Connor 1 ; Gallo, Pierce 2
Base Running:
RUNS: Garibay Jr., Guy 2 ; Bulman, Austin 1 ; Smigelski, Aaron 3 ; Becker, Nathan 1 ; Riedel, Jack 1
SB: Bulman, Austin 1 ; Walsh, Connor 1
HBP: Garibay Jr., Guy 1 ; Walsh, Connor 1
Game Leaders
Hitting
AB
4
R
3
H
2
RBI
2
AB
5
R
0
H
1
RBI
0
AB
4
R
2
H
1
RBI
0
AB
4
R
1
H
1
RBI
2
Players Mentioned
Inf.
/ BaseballInf.
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/ Baseball
Inf.
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Inf./OF
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