Grand Canyon's bats come through late to escape UTRGV in WAC baseball tournament
Grand Canyon's pitchers came through in the clutch, but it took six innings for the bats to come alive Wednesday night in the top seed's first Western Athletic Conference baseball tournament game.
Scoring a run in the sixth and two more in the seventh inning, the Antelopes escaped No. 7 UT Rio Grande Valley 3-1 at Hohokam Stadium in Mesa.
Cade Verdusco and Homer Bush Jr. delivered RBI hits in the seventh to break a 1-1 tie. The seventh started with Elijah Buries singling, then stealing second, setting up Verdusco, who singled him in. Bush then drove a ball for a double to score Verdusco.
It extended GCU's Division I-record winning streak to 14 games, and sets up Thursday night's winner's bracket game against Thursday morning's winner between No. 4 Seattle U and No. 6 UT Arlington.
Daniel Avitia, who made first-team All-WAC, pitched into the seventh inning, before being removed after giving up a one-out triple. Phoenix Horizon graduate Grant Richardson came on and GCU came away without giving up a run. A squeeze bunt to try to push the runner home missed, and first baseman Zach Yorke ended up tagging out the runner who was hung up between third and home.
Richardson picked up the win, but got help from former Phoenix Mountain Pointe pitcher Nathan Ward who got the final four outs, one of which was saved by Bush in center field. Bush sprinted to a deep fly ball and dived and caught it in the eighth inning, preventing extra bases.
Right-hander Colten Davis limited GCU (37-19) to just two hits through five innings.
In the sixth, Zack Gregory, on a 3-2 pitch, tied the score for the Lopes at 1-1 with a home run. It was the Arkansas transfer's team-leading 11th home run.
Resiliency has been a theme during GCU's 14-game winning streak, overcoming deficits, finding clutch pitching and hitting in late games to win.
To suggest human-interest story ideas and other news, reach Obert atrichard.obert@arizonarepublic.com or 602-316-8827. Follow him on Twitter@azc_obert
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: GCU's bats come through late to escape UTRGV in WAC baseball tourney
