ATHENS, Ga. - Fifth-ranked Georgia came from behind in both doubleheader games to hand Santa Clara baseball a pair of losses on Saturday. In the first game, the Bulldogs won 5-4 in 12 innings and was victorious 6-1 in the second game.
Game 1: Georgia 5 – Santa Clara 4 (12 innings)
Tucker Bradley hit a walk-off home run in the 12th inning as Georgia rallied twice to defeat Santa Clara 5-4 in the first game of the twin bill.
The Bulldogs (6-0) overcame deficits of three runs and one run heading to the sixth and 10th innings to tie the game before Bradley homered off Broncos reliever Travis Howard to extend their season opening win streak to six games.
Howard (2-1) was saddled with the loss. The Bronco right-hander went 5 2/3 innings allowing five hits, two runs, one earned and struck out seven.
Santa Clara (5-2) took a 4-3 lead in the top half of the 10th on Jake MacNichols' double off the left field wall to score Connor Henriques. On the play, MacNichols narrowly missed a home run when Bradley got his glove on the ball over the fencing before bringing the ball back in play.
Looking to close out the game, Howard began his fourth inning of work in the home half of the 10th. However the inning started ominously when Cam Shepherd reached on an error by the third baseman Henriques. Bradley singled to put runners at the corners before Riley King's RBI grounder tied things up at 4-all.
In the early goings, the Broncos built a 3-0 lead, scoring a run in the second, fourth and fifth innings on a pair of solo home runs by Matt Jew and Eamonn Lance sandwiching a Mike Bowes RBI grounder. For Lance, it was his first career home run in just his third at-bat.
The Bulldogs were held scoreless through five by Broncos starter Russell Grant and reliever Locke Bernhardt until breaking through in the sixth. King got a run in the sixth on a RBI sacrifice fly to cut the Broncos lead to 3-1. They scored twice in the seventh to tie the game up on a squeeze play by Ben Anderson and an RBI single by Buddy Floyd.
Jonathan Cannon (2-0) who tossed a scoreless 12th picked up the win. Bradley went 3-for-6 to pace the Bulldogs.
Jew and Dicochea each had two hits for the Broncos.