The story of the season for Maryland baseball has been fine margins.
When going against the No 1. Team in the nation, just one marginal mistake can turn the game into a blowout. That’s exactly what happened again on Sunday to Maryland.
The Terps were swept by the UCLA Bruins, losing the third of three by a score of 14-4 via the mercy rule at Jackie Robinson Stadium.
Head coach Matt Swope has harped on his pitching allowing offensive explosions within an inning, and rightly so. Throughout the series, the Bruins had seven multi-score innings, whereas Maryland had zero.
“There isn’t anything you can necessarily coach,” Swope said. “We have always led the league in walks and all you can do is just pass it onto the next guy and try and get 2-3 runs in an inning.”
Freebies have been a point of emphasis from Swope throughout this series, as he feels the Terps are competing but letting themselves down. Maryland shot itself in the foot multiple times in this series, and the best teams in the nation showed no sympathy in making them pay for their mistakes.
The eye-popping number was the 15 free passes. Nine of which were by base on balls and six more Bruin batters hit by pitches. The Bruins let up one.
“There isn’t a stone unturned,” Swope said. “We are going into everything, the mental reset, the physical mechanics, understanding everyone isn’t coached the same, but we are trying to correct it.”
Reliever Jayson Torres had three HBP’s and hit two and walked one to start the sixth, which saw Swope very animated, gesturing towards the crowd and seemingly urging Torres off the bump.
The Terps had only one fewer hit than the Bruins on Sunday afternoon, but still lost by ten.
It was just the freebies that plagued the Terps. They gave up four multi-run innings on Sunday, two of which were the first two innings of the night.
A seemingly frustrating afternoon was poetically capped off by a throwing error on an RBI single, which plated the 14th Bruin run and put the Terps out of their own misery.
A highlight for the Terps was a collegiate debut from reliever Austin Weiss. He came in for an inning and struck out two batters.
“I’m really proud of him [Weiss],” Swope said. “To come into a situation where I can’t imagine the nerves, I’m really proud of him for fighting.”
Offensively, the Terps were able to string nine hits together, but it was never in succession. Ryan Costello went deep in his return to the lineup to hit double-digit big flies on the season.
“I think that offensively, these three games have been our best three besides the runs scored, in terms of battling start to finish,” Swope said. “That’ s one of the best teams I’ve seen in my 15 years in the business.”
More RBI’s from the Terps came in garbage time with the game out of reach. But for as many plaudits as the Terp offense has received this year, this series certainly wasn’t one of their bright spots.
