The UC Irvine Anteaters Baseball team (16-19, 7-8) beat the University of Hawai’i (18-14, 8-10) Rainbow Warriors 5-1 on April 12, winning the final game in a series loss at Les Murakami Stadium in Honolulu.
The game began uneventfully, with Hawai’i senior right-handed starting pitcher Liam O’Brien and UCI senior right-handed starting pitcher Jack Ross throwing scoreless innings, giving up only two walks between them. The top of the inning remained scoreless, with Anteaters’ batters going down in order.
The bottom of the second proved more active, as Ross walked the lead-off man, senior outfielder Christian Hoffman, who advanced to third after two groundouts from sophomore catcher Jake Redding and senior infielder/outfielder Draven Nushida. Hoffman scored from third on an RBI-single up the middle from junior infielder Noah Rodriguez. Ross escaped the inning soon after on a fielder’s choice that resulted in Rodriguez making the third out at second base.
The Anteaters’ offense responded the next half-inning with O’Brien walking the first two batters, junior infielder Noah Alvarez and sophomore catcher Efren Ortega. With men on first and second with no outs, Hawai’i substituted O’Brien with sophomore left-handed pitcher Grant Garman, who proceeded to balk the runners to second and third. Four pitchers later, sophomore outfielder Daniel Polasek doubled to right field, scoring Alvarez.
Ortega, who advanced to third on the double, came around to score thanks to a sacrifice fly from redshirt junior infielder Frankie Carney. After striking out redshirt freshman Zach Doyle, the Rainbow Warriors opted to intentionally walk redshirt junior infielder Auggie Gutierrez. With runners on first and second with two outs, redshirt junior first baseman Alonso Reyes singled to the pitcher, resulting in bases loaded with two outs.
With two runs already given up, Garman was pulled for senior right-handed pitcher Saul Soto. Soto hit UCI junior utility-man Landon Gaz, scoring the third run of the inning. After hitting Gaz, Soto struck out Anteater shortstop Zach Fjelstad for the final out. The top of the third inning saw not just nine batters come to the plate, but also two Zachs — Doyle and Fjelstad— strike out.
Hawai’i went down in order during the bottom of the third, with UCI junior left-handed pitcher Ricky Ojeda striking out one and completing the inning in just seven pitches. Meanwhile, UCI had seven batters come to the plate in the top of the fourth. The traffic began with an Alvarez double down the left field line. He then advanced to third from an Ortega groundout, and scored from a single up the middle from Polasek. A walk from Carney on five pitches knocked out Soto, with Hawai’i instead substituting in senior left-handed pitcher Dylan Waite.
Waite then hit Doyle on his first pitch to load the bases and was promptly replaced by junior right-handed pitcher Tsubasa Tomii, who got out Gutierrez and elicited a groundnut from Reyes to escape the inning.
Ojeda encountered minimal traffic for his second-inning, allowing only a walk to Hawai’i junior pinch hitter Evan Rolbiecki, whilst striking out two. After an equally scoreless top of the fifth from the ‘Eaters, which saw strikeouts from Gaz and Fjelstad at the hands of Tomii. The bottom of the fifth saw a strikeout and walk before forcing two flyouts to foul ground and center field to end the inning.
UCI scored again in the top of the sixth, with Polasek singling to left field for his third hit of the game. Advancing to second on a sacrifice bunt from Carney, and then reaching third on a wild pitch, he ultimately scored off of a Doyle RBI-single to left-field. Doyle was tagged out at second-base for the second out of the inning. After a hit from Gutierrez, Reyes struck out swinging to end the inning. The seventh inning saw no scoring for either team.
In the top of the eighth inning, junior left-handed pitcher Caleb Okada forced the first two batters to fly out before allowing a double to Carney, who promptly stole third-base for his tenth of the year. Okada was pulled for junior right-handed pitcher Josiah Shipley, who intentionally walked Doyle who himself stole second-base. Shipley then loaded the bases on a walk to redshirt junior infielder James Castagnola, who replaced Gutierrez. With nowhere left to put a runner, Shipley escaped the inning when Reyes popped up to the shortstop.
Ojeda was replaced by redshirt senior right-handed pitcher Danny Suarez for the bottom of the inning. After allowing a bunt single, Suarez got a double-play and kept the inning scoreless after junior outfielder Rolbiecki lined out. Suarez closed the game, retiring the Rainbow Warriors in order, earning his second save of the season.
UCI pitcher Ojeda was assigned the win, going 2-3 on the season. For Hawai’i, O’Brien was assigned the loss, bringing his season record to 1-4. UCI’s next game is part of a three-game series on April 17 at Anteater Ballpark against the RV UC Santa Barbara Gauchos.
Stanley Shi is a Sports Intern for the spring 2026 quarter. He can be reached at szshi@uci.edu.
Edited by Jack Fedor and Tracy Sandoval.
