Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Stuff good enough to shut out Trojans
NO. 6 ARKANSAS 4, SOUTHERN CAL 0
FAYETTEVILLE — Blaine Knight did not have his best stuff in Friday’s series opener against Southern California.
But the right-hander for the No. 6 Arkansas Razorbacks knuckled down through the first four innings, kept USC off the board and benefitted from Luke Bonfield’s two-run home run and three RBI outing in a 4-0 victory before a crowd of 6,087 at Baum Stadium.
The University of Arkansas, Fayetteville (8-2) won its third consecutive game, and
its second in a row by shutout, capped by 6-8 freshman Jackson Rutledge’s three clean innings for his first save.
The Razorbacks posted back-to-back shutouts for the first time since blanking Kentucky 1-0 and 2-0 on April 2223, 2016, at Lexington, Ky.
Knight allowed 6 hits and 9 base runners in his 6 innings,
but the Trojans (7-2) stranded 7 against him and 8 for the game.
“My command was really not what it normally was for whatever reason,” Knight said. “I threw a bunch of offspeed to try to keep them off of anything hard.”
The Trojans, who had their seven-game winning streak snapped, did not record an extra-base hit and went 0 for 6 with runners in scoring position.
“We had guys on base for the first six innings and we had guys in scoring position,” USC Coach Dan Hubbs said. “I thought Knight did a nice job of just working himself through it and made a big pitch or two when he had a chance.”
Bonfield provided the big blow, a two-run shot over the left-field wall through a cross wind against 6-7 right-hander Chris Clarke (1-2) in the first inning after Jax Biggers led off with a single, stole second and moved to third on Heston Kjerstad’s ground out.
“I knew he was a sinker-ball pitcher and so I was kind of looking for something up over the plate and I got it,” Bonfield said. “I was able to put a good swing on it and catch a barrel.”
Hubbs said the fastball from Clarke was meant to be on the outside edge against the right-handed Bonfield.
“It just ran back over the middle of the plate and caught way too much plate and he squared it up pretty good,” Hubbs said.
USC put two runners on base in each of the first four innings but stranded six of them.
Catcher Grant Koch threw out Matthew Acosta on a steal attempt for the first out of the third inning after Acosta reached on a Knight error.
In the fourth inning, Angelo Armenta drew a leadoff walk and reached second on Kaleb Murphy’s one-out single. But Armenta stumbled after rounding second by several steps, center fielder Dominic Fletcher threw behind him and third baseman Casey Martin tagged him out in a rundown.
Knight’s best innings were the fifth and sixth. He retired the Trojans in order in the fifth and got an inning-ending 4-6-3 double play on his 98th and final pitch.
“He didn’t have his command today really and USC did a great job of laying off a lot of pitches and getting his pitch count up,” Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn said. “They have an older team with a lot of guys who have a good feel at the plate, and I thought defensively we made some good plays. They hit some balls right at us.”
Van Horn said Knight talked his way into pitching the sixth after throwing 88 pitches through five.
“He actually had a really good sixth inning,” Van Horn said. “He threw some of his better-located fastballs and
a couple of nice off-speed pitches.
“I think the maturity is coming out in him now that he doesn’t have to have his best stuff and he can still win.”
Said Hubbs, “I thought we squared up some balls right at them that we didn’t get rewarded for and they took what we gave them.”
Knight wriggled out of a jam in the second after Armenta and Brady Shockey singled to open the inning and moved up on Murphy’s sacrifice bunt.
Knight struck out ninehole hitter Chase Bushor, who entered the game with a team-high .421 average, then first baseman Jared Gates snared a sharp liner off the bat of Lars Nootbaar to end the threat.
Arkansas added to its lead in the fifth with two more runs off Clarke.
Biggers drew a one-out walk and stole second base before Eric Cole’s walk. Kjerstad roped a single through the right side to score Biggers and send Cole to third. Bonfield followed with an RBI ground out for his third RBI.
Rutledge was eager to get back on the mound after his throwing error led to two runs last Friday in a 4-3 loss to Cal Poly in Knight’s last start. The big right-hander allowed a two-out single to Bushor in the seventh and a one-out walk to Armenta in the ninth and struck out two.
“That was huge to be able to come back and just pump strikes and be able to have some success as compared to last time,” Rutledge said. “I’m happy with the way it went.”
The Razorbacks dropped their team ERA to 1.42 with 18 consecutive scoreless innings. Knight’s ERA fell to 0.53 with the only earned run allowed coming on a routine fly ball lost in the sun last Friday.