HONOLULU — An elite pro pitching prospect lived up to the billing at Les Murakami Stadium on Friday night.
UC Santa Barbara’s Tyler Bremner, a projected top-five pick in the 2025 MLB Draft, was on his game as he tamed Hawaii’s offense with eight strikeouts over six innings in a 2-1 win for the No. 15 Gauchos.
“As advertised,” UH coach Rich Hill said of the junior right-hander.
Bremner (2-0) and his teammates had memories of their last trip to the Les in the final series of the 2023 season, when UH achieved a sweep — capped with Stone Miyao’s walk-off homer in the final game.
[Note: See below for more photos of Hawaii-UC Santa Barbara baseball.]
“It's hard to forget that one we came out here and got swept in kind of a big situation for us in the season. We needed to win all three, I think, to win conference and to play on in the regionals,” Bremner said. “So it definitely left a sour taste in our mouth and (we’re) kind of coming here to redeem ourselves. Hawaii, I know they play well at home. So it's definitely going to be a dogfight for the next two games.”
UH (12-5, 1-3 Big West) dropped its third straight conference game while defending champion UCSB (15-2, 4-0) remained unblemished.
Hill summoned Itsuki Takemoto (1-3) to the mound to open a series for the first time this season and the Japanese star went head to head with Bremner for 5 2/3 innings. The sophomore right-hander stuck out six with no walks and four hits allowed.
Former Friday night starter Sebastian Gonzalez came on in effective relief and finished out the game with three hits, no walks and three strikeouts in 3 1/3.
Hill said Takemoto’s high levels of emotion was just what the team needed.
“Love the way our guys competed. I thought Takamoto was great, and Gonzalez out of the pen is everything that we could have asked for,” Hill said. “That’s a one-run game on a Friday night. You know, who's going to get that two-out hit? And they did.”
Designated hitter Isaac Kim had the go-ahead single to left off Takemoto in the top of the sixth.
Bremner (2-0) thought he might’ve touched 98 mph on his fastball, but he said his changeup was working the best. He shut himself down in the fall to let his arm recover and has steadily been ramping back up; he threw 92 on Friday.
He yielded four hits and three walks. Kamana Nahaku did the only damage on Bremner, smacking a solo shot to left on the first pitch he saw to tie it at 1-1 in the bottom of the fifth.
“I wouldn't say I've played too many games in front of big crowds, especially this is a big, big stadium, but yeah, I'm pretty comfortable here. I mean, it's, it's no different,” Bremner said.
With UH’s speedy top two batters in the order, Matthew Miura (2-for-3) and Shunsuke Sakaino (1-for-1, three walks) having the most success getting on base, the Gauchos dialed up dozens of pickoff attempts to first base on the night, leading to some lustful boos from the UH faithful of a couple thousand (3,948 tickets issued).
It resulted in a successful pickoff of Miura to end the fifth.
“Checks (UCSB head coach Andrew Checketts) is really good at controlling the runners, and that's a big thing,” Bremner said. “We're gonna pick a lot. We're not gonna let you just run in our face. And I think Checks kind of plays into the crowd boos a little bit too.”
Jackson Donovann got through the last three innings without yielding a hit for the Gauchos. Elijah Ickes narrowly beat out a game-ending double play, and Jared Quandt drew a two-out walk. Xaige Lancaster flied out to center to end it.
Saint Louis graduate Aiva Arquette, a shortstop for Oregon State, is the No. 7 prospect in the 2025 draft class, three spots behind Bremner in MLB.com's rankings. UH will host OSU in a four-game series May 2-5.
Saturday night’s 6:35 game is officially sold out but standing-room-only tickets are available. Liam O’Brien is set to start for UH.
Brian McInnis covers the state’s sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.
