SAN ANTONIO — UTSA hit its second grand slam of the week and used a strong pitching performance by Nolan Trabanino to dominate WKU, 14-2, on Friday night at Roadrunner Field.
Trabanino gave up two early runs in the second inning and held WKU off the board the rest of the way to earn his fifth win of the season. The southpaw logged seven innings on the hill and allowed two runs on nine hits with four strikeouts.
After WKU (10-21, 3-7 C-USA) plated its two runs in the second, UTSA (15-14, 5-5 C-USA) responded in the third and knotted the score at two on a Jesse Baker two-run home run.
The Roadrunners exploded for a seven-run fourth that featured the team's second grand slam in as many games. The first two runs of the inning scored on a Skyler Valentine two-run double after a walk, hit by pitch and fielding error loaded the bases. The bases were juiced once again after Baker took one on the shoulder and were cleared on the following at-bat after Kevin Markham sent a pitch over the right-field wall for his only hit of the game. The final run came across home plate three batters later on Ben Brookover's ground out to second.
UTSA sat comfortably in the driver's seat, but it added another two runs in the sixth and three more in the seventh.
Back-to-back doubles pushed across the pair of runs for the Roadrunners in the sixth.
In the seventh, Valentine led off the inning with his second hit of the night with a single to left and he advanced a base on a passed ball. The junior then came around to score on a Trent Bowles double. Brookover drove in the final runs of the game with his two-run single to right.
Five Roadrunners registered a pair of hits on the night with all starters notching at least one. Markham and Brookover also added four RBI to each of their stat lines.
Hilltoppers starter Ryan Thurston took the loss for WKU, as he went four innings and allowed nine runs on seven hits.
The weekend series will continue at 2 p.m. on Saturday.
