University of Louisville
Kentucky
No. 6 Baseball Falls at Rival Kentucky
April 06, 2010 | Baseball
April 6, 2010
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The No. 6 Louisville baseball team suffered its first mid-week loss of the season on Tuesday falling 5-0 at rival Kentucky at Cliff Hagan Stadium.
With their first shutout loss this season, the Cardinals dropped to 24-4 overall, while Kentucky improved to 19-11 on the season. Louisville was also held to a season-low four hits. It was the Cardinals worst offensive performance since being held to just three hits in 12-0 loss at Cal State Fullerton in game one of last season's NCAA Super Regional. Louisville will have a chance to even the season series with UK as the Wildcats pay a return visit to Jim Patterson Stadium on April 28 at 6 p.m. ET.
On the mound, redshirt freshman righty Justin Amlung took the loss and dropped to 0-1 overall despite allowing only one run on one hit in 1.1 innings of relief. Senior righty Tyler Mathis, making his first start since March 15, 2009, was outstanding allowing just one hit in 3.0 scoreless innings of work on the staff day for the Louisville pitchers.
For Kentucky, lefty Mike Kaczmarek earned the win after allowing just one hit in 4.0 scoreless innings of relief to improve to 1-0 on the season. Righty Jordan Cooper scattered three hits in 3.2 innings of work in the starting role, while Nick Kennedy recorded the final four outs of the game for the Wildcats.
At the plate for Louisville, sophomore infielder Ryan Wright had a single to extend his hitting streak to seven games, while freshman Zak Wasserman had an infield single to push his career best hitting streak to six games. On a day when the offense was unable to get things going, the Cardinals missed out on a golden chance to break through in the first inning. After loading the bases with just one out against Cooper, the freshman got Louisville junior third baseman Phil Wunderlich to bounce into an inning-ending 4-6-3 double play to end the threat.
In the third inning, freshman Kyle Grieshaber led off with a towering fly ball that left the ballpark down the left field line but was called foul. After a visit by Louisville head coach Dan McDonnell and a meeting by the umpiring crew, the call was upheld. Grieshaber then grounded out to the shortstop for the first out of the inning. Then in the fourth inning, Wunderlich hit a towering fly ball that hit the top of the wall in right center and bounced back into play for a leadoff double. However, after narrowly missing on a leadoff home run, Wunderlich was stranded at second base by the Cardinals to end that threat.
After the two pitching staffs dueled to three scoreless innings to start the game, Kentucky opened the scoring in the fourth as Cory Farris was hit by a two-out pitch from Amlung and then scored moments later on an RBI double down the right field line by Keenan Wiley for a 1-0 advantage.
An inning later, the Wildcats added to their lead with three runs on three hits, highlighted by a two-out, two-run home run by Gunner Glad off Cardinals' righty reliever Gabriel Shaw. UK started the scoring with an RBI single to left by Chad Wright to score Andy Burns. After a groundout by Chris Bisson, Glad hammered the first pitch he saw from Shaw over the wall in left field for his seventh home run of the season and a 4-0 lead.
UK added another run in the sixth inning as Taylor Black picked up a two-out double to right center off Louisville lefty reliever Brian Feekin and then scored on an RBI single to left by Marcus Nidiffer for a 5-0 advantage. Overall, four of the Wildcats' five runs were scored with two outs.
Up next, Louisville continues its eight-game road swing with a weekend series at BIG EAST foe Pittsburgh on Friday (6 p.m. ET), Saturday (3 p.m. ET) and Sunday (Noon ET).
Louisville Notes
- Senior second baseman Adam Duvall left Tuesday's game in the middle of the third inning after injuring his left hamstring while running the bases. The Louisville native and co-captain is listed as day-to-day and will be re-evaluated prior to Friday's series opener at Pittsburgh.
- The Cardinals also played Tuesday's game without junior outfielder Josh Richmond, who has now missed 20 games with a broken left (non-throwing) hand suffered on March 3 against Evansville.
- Prior to departing for Tuesday's game, the Louisville baseball players and coaches spent more than an hour signing autographs and visiting with patients at Kosair Children's Hospital in Louisville. It marks the fourth straight year the Cardinals have visited the hospital prior to leaving for the annual road game at UK.
