Morgan Homers To Lift Huskies Past Wildcats In Pac-12 Opener

Friday, March 18

Seattle, WA

5:00 PM

University of Washington

12-5, 0

Arizona

9-5, 0

Arizona

Washington

Photo by: Washington Athletics

Morgan Homers To Lift Huskies Past Wildcats In Pac-12 Opener

March 19, 2016 | Baseball

Box Score

By: Washington Athletics

SEATTLE – Catcher Joey Morgan hit a three-run homer in the seventh inning to break a 3-3 tie and send Washington to a 6-3 win over Arizona in the Pac-12 opener for both teams at Husky Ballpark Friday night.

With two outs in the seventh, Morgan took the first pitch he saw from Arizona reliever Cameron Ming over the left-field fence for his first home run of the season. Jack Meggs, who reached on a one-out single, and MJ Hubbs, who walked, scored ahead of Morgan.

The Morgan home run made a winner out Husky pitcher Noah Bremer (3-0), who entered the night with the lowest ERA among Pac-12 starters. Bremer allowed seven hits and three runs – two earned – in seven innings of work. He struck out six and saw his ERA inch up from 0.64 to 1.03.

The win improved Washington to 9-5 overall and 1-0 in Pac-12 play. The loss snapped a seven-game win streak for Arizona and dropped them to 12-5, 0-1 on the season.

“I'm excited for our guys; that's a good team we beat,” said Husky coach Lindsay Meggs. “They did not hand us the game. We had to scratch and claw for every run and did the same thing on the mound.”

The Huskies entered the day ranked second in the Pac-12 in hitting and they wasted little time in proving that their hot bats during the non-conference schedule were not a fluke.

In the Huskies' half of the first, Meggs reached on a fielder's choice and Hubbs followed with a run-scoring triple to extend his streak of reaching base safely to all 14 games. One out later, Chris Baker drove Hubbs home with a single off Arizona starter JC Clowey (1-2) to stake Bremer to a 2-0 lead.

Washington scored again in the fourth inning to increase its lead to 3-0. Baker and Duncan Hendrickson reached on back-to-back-singles to start the inning and put runners on the corners. Freshman designated hitter Willie MacIver fouled out to the first baseman Ryan Aguilar for the first out, but Baker was able to tag up and score on the play when Aguilar crashed into the railing along the first base line.

Bremer was cruising along until the fifth inning when Arizona sent eight hitters to the plate and struck for all three of its runs – all with two outs – to tie the score at 3-3. The Wildcats loaded the bases on a one-out single and a pair of two out walks, bringing up second baseman Cody Ramer. He singled home one run and a second runner was able to score when the first baseman Hendrickson had a relay throw home go off his glove for an error. Aguilar tied the game up with a RBI single on an 0-2 pitch.

The scored remained tied until Morgan's seventh inning blast.

After Morgan's home run, Bremer gave way to Spencer Jones, who recorded the first two outs of the eighth.

Troy Rallings entered the game in the eighth and got the final four outs – including a game-ending 6-4-3 double play – to pick up his fourth save of the season. For Rallings, it was his 19^th career save, tying him for third most all-time in school history with Michael Call.

Washington outhit Arizona 9-6 with Morgan, Baker and MacIver each picking up two hits.

The Huskies and Wildcats play game two of the three-game series Saturday at 2:00 p.m. PT.

Washington 6 (9-5, 1-0), Arizona 3 (12-5, 0-1)

ARIZ 000 030 000 –- 3 6 1
WASH 200 100 30x –- 6 9 1

LOB: AZ 4, UW 6. JC Cloney, Austin Schnabel (7), Cameron Ming (7) and Cesar Salazar; Noah Bremer, Spencer Jones (8), Troy Rallings (9) and Joey Morgan. W – Bremer (3-0). L – Cloney (1-2). Sv – Rallings (4). HR – UW, Joey Morgan (1). 3B – UW, MJ Hubbs. 2B – none. Time – 2:47. Attendance – 670.