Bruins Even Series With 6-2 Win Over Oregon

After dropping the series opener 3-2, UCLA desperately needed to take the final two games of their series at Oregon and they got the first one today, 6-2. Despite a steady rain that lasted all game, Trevor Bauer threw his second complete game of the season for the Bruins. While it wasn't as good as his one-hitter earlier in the season, it was a strong six hit, two run performance that earned him his team-leading seventh win of the season.

UCLA was first on the board with a two out rally that netted them a run in the first. Casey Haerther smashed a two out double to right and after a walk by Cody Decker, Blair Dunlap singled to left, scoring Haerther.

Dunlap was at the center of things when the Bruins scored their second run of the game in the fourth inning too. The redshirt junior reached on a bunt single and stole secon with one out. After a strikeout, Dunlap took third on a wild pitch and Gino Aielli hit a 2-1 pitch to left field, plating Dunlap and giving UCLA a 2-0 lead.

The Ducks got that run back in the bottom half of the inning though when their leadoff batter walked and took second on a wild pitch. After a sacrifice bunt moved him to third, it looked like the inning might stall when Bauer was able to snap a grounder back to him and get the out while keeping the runner at third. Oregon was able to get a two out single though to score the runner and cut the Bruins' advantage to 2-1.

The Bruins broke the game open in the top half of the fifth though. Tyler Rahmatulla led off the inning with an infield single and Eddie Murray doubled to put runners on second and third with nobody out. Chris Giovinazzo was able to plate Rahmatulla and still reach base when a fielder's choice was not in time, giving UCLA a 3-1 lead and runners on the corners. Haerther struck out for the first out of the inning, but Decker walked to load the bases. Dunlap picked up another RBI with a fielder's choice that got Decker at second, but beat out the throw from second on the double play attempt. With UCLA ahead 4-1, Dunlap took off trying to swipe second and while he was caught stealing, he pulled up short of the bag. By the time Oregon tagged Dunlap out, Giovinazzo had scored to give the Bruins a 5-1 lead.

Oregon was able to cut the lead to 5-2 in the sixth, but the Bruins got that run back in the ninth, giving the game its 6-2 final score.

Dunlap finished the game with two hits in four at-bats, a run, a stolen base and a pair of RBI for UCLA. Aielli was the only other Bruin with two hits and he had a RBI to go with it as well. Rahmatulla was only 1-4 on the afternoon, but he led UCLA with two runs.

UCLA is now 21-22 and and 12-8 in Pac-10 play, which has them in third place. The Bruins will get another chance at getting back to .500 tomorrow at 1 pm PDT when Charles Brewer takes to the hill for the blue and gold. As always, you can follow along with the Bruins on GameTracker via the official site. You can also get game updates, Bruins in the pros updates, updates on UCLA commits, thoughts on the program, key information and regional updates on my UCLA baseball twitter.