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Friday - February 2, 2007

Game 1: San Diego at Texas

'Had to work today and missed the opener. I always try to go to the home opener but just couldn't get away from work. That Dell Diamond is way too far away! Hopefully, I'll make the "real" home opener when the Horns play their first game of 2007 at Disch-Falk.

At any rate, I did try to listen to the game but didn't manage to actually hear much of it.

The line:

																			R	H	E
San Diego			0	0	1			1	3	1			0	0	0		-		6	15	1
Texas			0	0	0			0	0	1			1	0	3		-		5	10	0

The Toreros threatened early and came through on a solo home run in the 3rd. The Horns had the bases loaded with two outs in the 6th when San Diego finally replaced their starter (Brian Matusz who pitched a very good game...or so it sounded). The replacement (A.J. Griffin) coaxed a fly ball to lf out of pinch-hitting Russell Moldenhauer to get out of trouble.

The Horns started fighting back in the 6th. In the 8th, Travis Tucker got his 3rd hit of the game and moved to 3b on a single by pinch-hitter Clay Van Hook. Sadly, those hits were sandwiched between a strikeout, a fly out, and a ground out. Too bad.

After Keith Shinaberry threw a 1-2-3 top-of-the-9th, Jordan Danks went to bat and singled up the middle to start off a big rally. Preston Clark struck out and Bradley Suttle followed that up by walking to put runners at 1b and 2b. Pat McCrory doubled to lf. Jordan scored on the hit. The left fielder tried to catch Pat off 2b and threw wide of the 2b bag. The ball went into the rf corner (I think) allowing Bradley to score and Pat to move to 3b. San Diego sent Matt Couch in to pitch. Kyle Russell grounded out to 2b, scoring Pat. Travis got hit by the first pitch to put the tying run on base. Chance Wheeless struck out to end the game. How sad. What an exciting 9th! Too bad it had such a sad ending.

Randy Boone started and took the loss. He gave up 5 runs on 9 hits in 4.1 innings. Joseph Krebs did a good job in relief. He gave up one run on 6 hits and struck out 6 in 3.2 innings. Keith threw that 1-2-3 9th.

Coach Garrido's post-game radio comments (para-phrased):

• It's all about the pitching. Their first pitcher is one of the best pitchers in America. His fast ball is 92-94 mph and his change-up is 20 mph slower and has lots of movement.
• Pitching like that can really make you look bad at the plate but the batters learned something about shortening their swing and staying still with 2 strikes. [Ed. note: Huh? There were lots of swinging strikeouts which does not strike (heh) me as being particularly still. Maybe I just misheard.]
• The team showed the right kind of character by fighting back.
• He's looking forward to seeing what they do tomorrow.
• The UT pitchers did well fighting out of trouble.
• It was a disappointment to lose but not a completely disappointing day.

I'm gonna try to make it to tomorrow's game. It's gonna be cold, though, and I'm not sure I want to sit out in that kind of weather. We shall see.

Posted by Joanna at 8:17 PM