The UCSB baseball team lost two of three games to #23 Oregon State over the weekend in the team’s second series against top 25 competition.

[media-credit id=20125 align=”alignleft” width=”166″][/media-credit]UCSB dropped to 10-8 after the series. The Beavers improved to 18-6.

“This was a very important win for us for a lot of reasons,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “[We beat] a ranked team after losing a couple of games, and it was on the road.”

Sunday’s 8-3 win helped the Gauchos avoid their second sweep of the season. They jumped to a 5-1 lead through the first four innings in an offensive effort that was missing from the Gauchos’ play in the previous two games.

“We came out and scored early,” senior center fielder Ben Edelstein said. “We had a habit in the first two games of being content with our runs and relying on our pitching. We started [the third game] strong.”

Senior right fielder Mark Haddow, Edelstein and senior first baseman Trevor Whyte all had multiple hits for UCSB, which recorded 15 hits throughout the game. Freshman Brandon Trinkwon played an outstanding game for the Gauchos, hitting 4-5 with two RBIs and scored three runs.

“[Trinkwon] had a great game,” senior right-hander Jesse Meaux said. “It’s always good to see freshmen do well. We’ve been expecting it.”

In OSU’s 11-5 win on Saturday, the team showcased its offensive power in the early innings of the game, scoring four on junior right-hander Matt Vedo in the first inning. Vedo fell to 3-3 on the season.

“Vedo didn’t have the control he usually has,” Meaux said. “And it’s tough when your bullpen is already in the game during the second inning.”

UCSB recorded two errors during the game.

Meaux started for the Gauchos in Friday’s 6-3 loss against OSU. Beaver pitcher Sam Gaviglio, who entered the series with a 38.2-consecutive scoreless inning streak, allowed two runs in 7.2 innings. In his previous start, Gaviglio pitched a perfect game through eight innings against Long Beach State.

UCSB was the first team of the season to score a run on the right-hander.

“The challenge was to score runs on him, but we wanted to beat him,” Brontsema said. “We scored runs but didn’t beat him; we would’ve liked it to go the other way.”

Meaux allowed four runs on six hits, walking three batters and striking out one in 4.2 innings. Haddow scored two runs for UCSB and junior Lance Roenicke added two hits, but Oregon State prevailed 6-3.

The Gauchos will take the field for practice this week in preparation for a game at Loyola Marymount on Wednesday.

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