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| Senior Jose Hernandez tripled, homered and drove home two runs on Wednesday. |
HOUSTON ? Seniors Jose Hernandez and Michael Rockett both hit their team-leading fourth home runs of the year to lead a 14-hit offensive attack and UTSA wrapped up its five-game road trip with a winning record in a 14-8 victory at Houston on Wednesday.
The Roadrunners (6-3) took advantage of three costly Cougars errors by scoring nine unearned runs and posted their fourth come-from-behind win of the season. They sent Houston to its sixth loss in a row and worst 10-game start in the 15-year Raynor Noble era (third-worst start in school history).
"We did another great job of responding today after falling behind early," head coach Sherman Corbett said. "I don't want us to make a habit of that, but anytime you can rally on the road, especially at a tough place like Houston, it says something about the determination of your ballclub. We were able to finish the road trip with a winning record and we need to carry that momentum into this weekend's conference opener against Southeastern Louisiana."
After the Cougars touched UTSA starter Ryan Proudfoot for two runs in the first, the Roadrunners responded with four runs in the third to take the lead for good.
UTSA tacked on a two-spot an inning later to extend the advantage to 6-2, but Houston added one in its half of the frame to pull within three. The Roadrunners then pushed three runs across the plate in the fifth and looked to be in control, but the Cougars erupted for five runs on six hits to cut the deficit to one at 9-8.
Following a scoreless sixth, UTSA posted a five-spot of its own to put the game out of reach.
Sophomore Tyler Carpenter led four players with two-or-more hits by going 3-for-6 with two runs and an RBI to extend his hitting streak to 10 games dating back to May 23, 2008. Rockett, who started the contest 0-for-4, unloaded a three-run homer in the seventh and the long ball pushed his hitting streak to 14 contests dating back to May 16 a year ago. It also was the 27th bomb of his illustrious career and he moved into a fourth-place tie with Ryan Smith (1997-2000) on the program's all-time list.
Sophomore Brett Aguilar was 2-for-6 with a career-high four RBIs, while Hernandez finished the rout 2-for-4 with two runs, a triple and a pair of RBIs. Junior Lance Brown collected two safeties and scored three times.
Freshman left-hander Casey Selsor (2-0) picked up his second relief win of the season with 1.2 scoreless innings. The San Antonio native gave up one hit and walked three but was able strand all the base runners. Senior right-hander J.P. Holton struck out three in a pair of hitless frames and junior righty Zach Calhoon blanked the Cougars in the ninth.
Caleb Ramsey led Houston by going 3-for-4 with a run scored and an RBI.
Jared Ray (0-2) was tagged with the loss after giving up six runs (three earned) on a half dozen hits and three walks in his 3.1 innings. Six Houston relievers came out of the bullpen and they combined to surrender eight runs (two earned) on eight hits over the final 6.2 frames.
Proudfoot allowed eight runs on 10 hits in his 4.1 innings of work.
UTSA kicks off the 33-game Southland Conference slate on Friday night when it hosts Southeastern Louisiana (5-3) in the opener of a three-game series at Roadrunner Field. First pitch is slated for 6 p.m. The Birds have won 17 of their last 20 games at their on-campus facility and 50 in the past three seasons (50-13/.794).