OREM, Utah – The UTRGV baseball team is now on a six-game winning streak in Western Athletic Conference (WAC) play thanks to a 3-1 win over the Utah Valley University Wolverines on Friday at UCCU Ballpark.
Overall, the Vaqueros (19-13, 7-6 WAC) are winners of nine of their last 11 games.
The Vaqueros got on the board against Logan Gerling (5-2) in the second, when with runners on the corners and one out, junior Adrian Torres hit a grounder to short for a run-scoring fielder’s choice to make the score 1-0.
In the fourth, graduate student Brandon Pimentel hit a no-doubt home run to right field, his ninth of the season, and then one out later, graduate student Montcair Clain cleared the center field wall with his third home run of the season to make the score 3-0.
Pimentel now has 21 home runs in his UTRGV career, tied for the second-highest total in program history with Freddy Rojas Jr. (2000-22) and Jesse Gutierrez (2000). The program record holder is 27 by Hall of Famer Mitchell Moran(1981-83).
Graduate student Jesus Aldaz (3-2) made the runs stand up, allowing one run on three hits while striking out four in 6.0 innings.
The Wolverines (17-16, 4-7 WAC) scored their run in the fifth on a groundout by Matthew Schwarz.
Junior Zach Tjelmeland pitched a season-high tying 3.0 scoreless innings, striking out a career-high tying five, for his career-high third save.
UTRGV and Utah Valley play the middle game of this 3-game series on Saturday at 3 p.m. Fans can watch domestically on ESPN+ or internationally via WAC International.