April 17, 2015
SAN DIEGO, Calif. - Nevada scored five runs in both the sixth and eighth innings to break open a close game en route to a 14-3 victory over San Diego State Friday night at Tony Gwynn Stadium. The loss dropped the Aztecs to 27-12 overall and 14-5 in the Mountain West as the Wolf Pack (29-9, 14-05 WM) moved into a first-place tie with SDSU atop the conference standings.
San Diego State found itself behind form the outset as Nevada opened the contest with a pair of runs in the top of the first off SDSU starter Bubba Derby. The Aztecs cut the deficit in half with a run of their own in the bottom of the inning on Danny Sheehan's two-out RBI single.
Derby would go on to strike out seven batters in a row from the first through third frames, but ran into trouble again in the fourth as the visitors rallied for two more runs on an single, RBI double, sacrifice bunt and an Aztec error to make it 4-1.
SDSU answered again, this time with an unearned run in the bottom of the inning and added another in its half of the fifth on Seby Zavala's sacrifice fly to make it a 4-3 contest.
From there, however, it was all Wolf Pack as they scored five times in the next inning on five hits, a walk and an SDSU miscue. They then plated five more two frames later on four hits, two walks and another Aztec error.
Derby (5-4) would eventually be saddled with the loss after going 5.1 innings and allowing seven runs on nine hits with a walk and nine strikeouts. Aztec pitchers struck out a total of 15 Nevada batters on the night.
Evan McMahan, who had come on in the fifth with a runner on base and no outs, went the final five innings surrendering no runs on three hits with six strikeouts to pick up the win and improve to 4-0 on the season.
Sheehan was the lone Aztec to record more than one hit in the contest as he finished with a pair of singles, an RBI and one run scored.
San Diego State and Nevada will continue their weekend series on Saturday (April 18) with a game scheduled to get underway at 2:00 p.m. at Tony Gwynn Stadium.