April 15, 2006
SANTA CLARA, Calif. - The Santa Clara University baseball team suffered only its second sweep of the season Saturday afternoon as the Pepperdine Waves captured a 6-2 victory at Stephen Schott Stadium. With the loss the Broncos fall three games off the pace for a place in the WCC Championship Series with 12 contests remaining.
Matt Wickswat, although falling to 6-2 on the year with the loss, pitched well over six innings, allowing only two runs and striking out two while keeping the Broncos in the game. Donald Brandt had a pair of hits in four at-bats Sunday for Santa Clara, but for the second-straight game timely hits escaped SCU.
Pepperdine went up 2-0 in the top of the fourth after Chad Tracy and Nick Kliebert, who each had a pair of hits in the game, led things off with singles and were brought home with sacrifice flies. The Broncos answered in their half of the frame with a run as Daniel Nava drove in Dustin Realini, but with the tying run on third and Brandt at the plate, Nava was picked off of first to end the threat.
The Waves blew the game open in the seventh, as a pair of singles to start the inning led to a Justin Tellam RBI single, and following a walk to load the bases, pinch-hitter Luke Salas drove in a pair with another single to bring the Wave advantage to 5-1. David Uribes drove in Pepperdine's final run with a two-out single.
Uribes led Pepperdine at the plate with a 3-for-5 day and an RBI. Denny Duron had a pair of hits for the Waves.
Waves starter James Johnson lasted six and a third innings, allowing only five hits and a run to up his mark to 3-1 on the season. After giving up one-out singles Kris Watts and Nava in the seventh, he was relieved by Bryan Minkel who stopped the bleeding by getting the next two batters on a fly out and strikeout, respectively.
The Broncos threatened one more time in the eighth, loading the bases with none out on three consecutive walks. After a strikeout, Realini beat out a relay throw to first to keep the inning alive and bring in Kevin Drever to cut the deficit to four, but a groundout ended the inning a batter later.