HOUSTON — Freshman Chance Kirby pitched his first complete game and UTSA hit a pair of home runs en route to a 7-1 victory at No. 16 Rice Owls on Sunday afternoon at Reckling Park.
Kirby struck out a career-best nine batters and did not issue a walk over his nine innings. The right-hander scattered seven hits and allowed just one run for the Roadrunners (23-17, 10-8 C-USA).
Offensively, UTSA outhit Rice, 9-7, with six players registering a hit. Jesse Baker, John Bormann and Ben Brookover led the team with a pair of base hits apiece.
The Roadrunners managed to jump to an early 3-0 lead before the Owls (26-16, 14-7 C-USA) erased the shutout in the sixth.
Matt Hilston scored the Roadrunners’ first two runs, as he came home in the third on Baker’s ground out and again In the fifth when he led off with a single and made his way around the bases on an error, balk and wild pitch.
Baker drove in the second run of the inning with his one-out double.
A four-run seventh cushioned the lead to 7-1.
A pair of home runs scored all those runs, as Brookover led off the inning with a solo shot. Five batters later, C.J. Pickering blasted a three-run homer.
Kirby kept the Owls scoreless in the final three innings to snap Rice’s four-game win streak.
Southpaw Blake Fox was charged with the loss in six innings of work. Fox allowed four runs (three earned) on five hits and struck out six.
UTSA will return to the Bird Bath on Tuesday, April 21, when it welcomes Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (19-16) to town for a 6 p.m. contest.