USC Baseball Loses Game 1 To Stanford

USC baseball began its series with No.11 Stanford on a bad note. The Trojans struggled offensively and the pitching relented to the Cardinal offense.

From USCTrojans.com:

"LOS ANGELES – Mark Appel allowed just four hits in a complete game effort Friday as the No. 11 Stanford Cardinal took game one of a Pac-10 Conference series over the USC Trojans with an 8-1 victory at Dedeaux Field. Appel gave up one unearned run with no walks and seven strikeouts and had a no-hitter going through six innings before Adam Landecker led off the seventh with a single. Tyler Gaffney went 3-for-3 with a triple and a walk while Brian Ragira was 3-for-5 with one RBI for Stanford (15-7, 3-1). Andrew Triggs took the loss for USC (11-19, 2-5), allowing five runs on 10 hits in seven innings of work with a walk and five strikeouts. Appel and Triggs threw goose eggs on the scoreboard through the first four innings before the Cardinal struck first with four runs in the fifth inning. Gaffney walked to lead off the inning, followed by four consecutive hits by Cardinal batters. Austin Wilson hit a two-run double to left for the first runs. In the next at-bat, Zach Jones singled to center and Jake Stewart lofted a sacrifice fly to left as the Cardinal would cruise from there. Ben Clowe’s sacrifice fly in the seventh plated another run in the seventh with the Trojans’ lone run coming in the bottom of the inning. Stanford would add another run in the eighth and two more in the ninth for insurance. A double from Matt Foat and single by James Roberts put runners at first and third in the USC eighth, but Appel struck out pinch-hitter Alex Glenn and got a 4-6-3 double play ball from Kevin Roundtree to extinguish the scoring opportunity. The USC-Stanford series continues tomorrow with a 6 p.m. start and a 1 p.m. start on Sunday. Both games will feature a video webcast, along with Gametracker live stats, on usctrojans.com. Notes: The 17 hits allowed by USC pitchers tonight was a season high…Adam Landecker broke up a deep no-hit bid for the second time this season, getting a base hit in the eighth inning on March 26 against UCLA’s Trevor Bauer."

USC has really struggled in Pac-10 play. Frank Cruz has brought a good energy to the program, but the results haven’t shown up in the win column yet.