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Sports

Houston College Classic showcases Houston bats

Cougars defeat Baylor Friday to open College Classic at Minute Maid Park, end on sour note after suffering losses to Texas A&M and Arizona State

by LOUIE VERA
The Daily Cougar

The magic the Cougars had on opening day Tuesday with Wes Musick was not there against No.16 Arizona State at Minute Maid Park Sunday afternoon.

UH (2-2) fell behind early giving up four runs in the first inning and was unable to bounce back as the Sun Devils defeated the Cougars 11-1 in their final game at the Houston College Classic.

"We've got a lot of work to do," head coach Rayner Noble said. "They've got a good hitting ball club there is no doubt about that."

On whether anything could have been done to prevent ASU from jumping out to a big lead, Noble said that the team struggled defensively and offensively.

"I don't think we played very well in all facets of the ballgame," Noble said. "If we would have played a little bit of defense in that first inning, there were a couple of plays that (we) could have made."

Musick started the game and gave up a lead off homerun to Sun Devil's second baseman Eric Sogard that started the rally for ASU. Two batters later, Ike Davis added a run with a RBI double off the left field wall for a 2-0 lead. With one out in the inning Sun devil centerfielder CJ Retherford hit a sacrifice fly to left field to give ASU a 4-0 advantage.

The Cougars lone run came in the bottom of the second inning when second baseman Bryan Pounds belted a solo shot into the Crawford boxes. Pounds also came in for his first career pitching appearance in the eighth for 2/3 innings of work.

Pitching for the Cougars was out of synch as they gave up runs in six of the nine innings against the Sun Devils.

The Cougars finished 1-2 in the tournament defeating No. 20 Baylor on Friday and falling to Texas A&M 3-2 Saturday afternoon.

"I think there were a few bright spots. Today you can chalk it up as a learning experience (against ASU)," Noble said. "I thought Friday and Saturday we did an admirable job. From an offensive stand point we need to get a few guys going -- there is no doubt about that. I was fairly pleased, you never really want to go 1-2, but we just need to get guys on the mound that understand what they need to do."

Against the Aggies, the Cougars posted two runs off solo homeruns from sophomores Jimmy Cesario and Felix Fanaselle. Fanaselle's towering homerun came in his second collegiate at-bat in the first inning, he finished 2-for-4 on the afternoon.

 UH freshman southpaw Donnie Joseph made his first collegiate start in the loss and pitched a solid game, giving up one unearned run off five hits in five innings.

Friday's win saw another solid pitching performance, along with offensive consistency. Cougar batters tallied up 13 hits and junior right hander Aaron Brown threw five innings of one-hit baseball in UH's third consecutive win against Baylor.

The team's next game is Tuesday at Cougar Field against Sam Houston State.

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