UCLA Batters Overwhelmed In 4-0 Loss To #3 Arizona St.

At the launching pad that is Packard Stadium in Tempe, Arizona, Gerrit Cole pitched well against the Pac-10's highest scoring offense. It didn't matter though because he was going up against #3 Arizona St.'s Mike Leake who has dominated opposing offenses all year. Cole wen 6.1 innings and allowed only two runs on two hits while striking out nine, but he was no match for Leake. Leake entered the game 13-1 with a 1.35 ERA and it only got better because the junior threw a complete game, four-hit, nine strikeout shutout versus UCLA in the Sun Devils' 4-0 win on Friday night.

The two teams traded zeros for four innings until Arizona St. finally got on the board in the fifth when Cole got too much of the plate with his 2-0 pitch and saw it fly deep over the right field fence.

Ahead 1-0, the Sun Devils tallied again and it began with a leadoff walk. After the baserunner swiped second, Cole struck out the next batter, but the third strike found its way to the backstop so the batter was safe and first and the baserunner at third. From there, it took a measly ground ball to score a run and move the ASU lead to 2-0.

After recording the first out of the seventh, Cole was pulled in favor of Rob Rasmussen, who got the final two outs of the inning. Rasmussen ran into eighth inning trouble when he issued a two-out walk, the allowed a two-run home run, giving the game its final 4-0 score.

While the Sun Devils were getting a few runs of their own, Leake was cruising. He allowed four hits on the night and only one was an extra base hit. That was a one-out double by Gino Aielli in the fourth. That double was one of only two times all game that the Bruins got a runner past first base.

The Bruins and Sun Devils will play game two of their three-game set on Saturday at 6:30 pm PDT. UCLA is now 26-28 and with only two games left to play, have been eliminated from postseason consideration. The loss, combined with Oregon St.'s win also has the Bruins in a tie for third place in the conference. 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.