HONOLULU — There’s spoiling title hopes, and then there’s what the Hawaii baseball team did to UC Santa Barbara on Thursday night.
With UH out of the running for the Big West title picture, it might have been expected that the Rainbow Warriors would spend senior weekend finalizing their summer plans – not throwing up a roadblock to the Gauchos’ designs at late-season glory.
But that’s what happened at Les Murakami Stadium in a 17-1 stunner to open up the final three-game series of the year. Matt Wong smacked two home runs in the first three innings to lead the offensive outburst and Harry Gustin and Alex Giroux struck out nine batters apiece to save the ‘Bows’ bullpen for Friday and Saturday’s action.
UH (27-20, 16-12 Big West) matched its season high in runs and clinched its second winning Big West season under Rich Hill in his second year as coach. Prior to his arrival in 2022, UH never accomplished one.
“Where do you start?” Hill told the Spectrum Sports crew afterward. “Harry Gustin just gutting it out. And then Alex Giroux striking out (eight) in a row. But man, what a dominant performance on the mound.
“Matt Wong, c’mon, reaching base (six times on) senior weekend, hitting a couple bombs. That was awesome.”
UCSB (35-18, 18-10) was playing for a shared Big West title if it could sweep UH this weekend. With that now out of the question, the Gauchos are now looking to burnish their resume for a possible at-large berth to the NCAA tournament. There’s also a slim chance they could get the Big West’s automatic bid if struggling Cal Poly upsets Cal State Fullerton on Friday and Saturday; UC San Diego, which already clinched at least a share of the Big West title at 21-9, is ineligible for the postseason as a transitional Division I program.
Wong, the Saint Louis alumnus who entered the night with eight home runs on his senior season, became the first UH player to hit multiple home runs in a game at the Les since Adam Fogel in 2019. He became the first UH player with double-digit homers in a season since Jeff Van Doornum launched 14 in 2010.
Both of his opposite-field bombs came on two-strike counts. He finished the night 3-for-3 with three walks, two RBIs and three runs scored.
“I wasn’t thinking about any type of hit at all. I was just thinking battle, battle, battle,” Wong told KHON2’s Christian Shimabuku of his homers. “Anything I could do to stay alive or get on base would be important.”
Nearly every player in the lineup enjoyed a big day as UH smacked 18 hits and drew 10 walks. Jordan Donahue was 4-for-5 with three RBIs in the No. 9 hole; Aaron Ujimori was 3-for-5 with three runs scored at No. 8; Jared Quandt was 2-for-3 with two walks and four runs at No. 7. Dallas Duarte and Jacob Igawa also had multi-hit games and drove in three apiece.
Gauchos starter Matt Ager was chased after giving up six runs in the second inning. The 'Bows proceeded to lay waste to a procession of Gauchos relievers.
“We don’t do this all the time, but we’re capable of doing this all the time,” Wong said. “We’ve still got two more to go, but we’re excited.”
Gustin loaded the bases in both of the first two innings and got out of it largely unscathed, with a lone Gaucho run put up in the first.
He made his final start of the year a memorable one, going five innings to improve to 5-3 with a 3.06 earned-run average.
All Giroux did was strike out eight batters in a row from the time he entered in the sixth inning through the eighth. He fanned Nick Oakley to end the game as UH pitching finished with a season-high 18 strikeouts. Giroux got the automatic four-inning save, his second of the year.
A few more shots from Thursday's game:
Brian McInnis covers the state's sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.