BELLEVUE, Wash. -- Junior right-hander Evan Gibbons pitched seven shutout innings and set a career high with seven strikeouts, combining with teammate Cooper Rons on a four-hit shutout as the Sacramento State baseball team opened a three-game Western Athletic Conference series with a 6-0 victory over host SeattleU on Friday evening at Bannerwood Baseball Park in Bellevue, Wash.
The win was the second straight to start a season-long run of nine straight games away from home as the Hornets improved to 20-18 overall and 7-9 in WAC play. The Redhawks, who were shutout for the first time in 2023, fell to 11-23 overall and moved into a tie with Sacramento State in the standings with a 7-9 league record.
Gibbons (2-4) was dominant on the mound to pick up his first win since Feb. 19, facing just four over the minimum in tossing his third consecutive "quality start" — and the sixth such performance by a Hornet starter this year. He allowed only six baserunners on the day and all four hits were mere singles as only two of the six baserunners reached scoring position.
The seven innings pitched tied his career high, while the seven strikeouts surpassed his previous career best of four set against Central Michigan back on March 10.
Following a 1-2-3 seventh, Rons then took the Hornets the rest of the way, retiring all six batters he faced over the final two innings and striking out a pair to help Sacramento State to its third shutout of the year.
Meanwhile, the Hornets' offense was firing on all cylinders, jumping out to an early lead on Wehiwa Aloy's 10th home run of the season in the first and tacking on two more in the third thanks to an Aloy RBI double and a run-scoring groundout by JP Smith for a 3-0 advantage.
A Jorge Bojorquez ground ball plated another run in the fourth and Sacramento State capped the scoring with two runs in the eighth on a single up the middle by Jacob Cortez and a bases-loaded walk issued to Josh Rolling three batters later.
Aloy's home run gave the Hornets a round-tripper in each of their last five games and moved the freshman into a tie for second with Rhys Hoskins for the most home runs hit by a freshman in the program's Division I history. His run-scoring double in the third gave him his 19th multi-hit game of the season — the most by a Sacramento State player since Matt Smith (21), Ryan Walstad (21), and Trevor Doyle (20) all reached 20 games in 2021.
Smith also finished with two hits in the game for his 10th multi-hit game of the season, while five other batters ended the night with a hit.
Game two of the series is scheduled for Saturday (April 22) at 2 p.m., with sophomore left-hander Noah Lucchesi slated to take the mound for the Hornets.
