CORVALLIS, Ore. – The University of British Columbia Baseball team was named the Under Armour Team of the Week for April 3 – 9 the Cascade Collegiate Conference announced Sunday.
This Friday and Saturday, British Columbia and Bushnell University faced off again in Vancouver, B.C. for its CCC showdown. Earlier this season, the T-Birds and Beacons split their nonconference series. Each team held seven conference wins before heading into the weekend. With the help of dominant pitching and timely hitting, UBC was able to take all four contests for a full sweep over Bushnell.
On the mound on Friday, Sean Heppner reached a career-high 13 strikeouts in seven complete innings to lead to the first 4-2 win for the T-Birds. In the second game, Ryan Beitel pitched six innings, sitting down nine Beacon batters to secure another UBC victory with a score of 10-3. Offensively on day one, the T-Birds were led by right fielder Johnny McGill who put up a combined five hits and six RBIs on the day to lead the way at the plate for UBC.
The next day, the Thunderbird's offense was firing on all cylinders to complete another dominant doubleheader sweep of the Bushnell Beacons. Trent Lenihan homered for the second consecutive day for the T-Birds and Mike Fitzsimmons scored five runs and drove in five more, leading UBC to mercy Bushnell in both games. Defensively in the first Saturday game, Daniel Orfaly threw six shutout innings and struck out five batters to lead to the 11-0 win. In the second game of the day, Daniel Sereda also did not allow an earned run in three innings pitched while striking out four batters in the 14-4 victory.
"I think we're just starting to do what we're capable of," said UBC head coach Chris Pritchett. “This is what we were hoping for, we're starting to hit our stride now, just in time, now we just need to keep it going."
British Columbia now holds the second spot in the CCC standings with a 25-15 overall record. Next week, the T-Birds will play Seattle University twice during their bye week before their next conference series against (RV) Oregon Tech on April 22-23 in Klamath Falls, Oregon.