May 19, 2006
TUCSON, Ariz. - Thanks to the right arm of Tony Barnette and the bat of Colin Curtis, the Arizona State Sun Devils took care of the rival Arizona Wildcats 15-6 Friday night at Kindall Field in Tucson. With the win, the Devils improve to 33-17, 11-8 in Pac-10 play. Barnette went six plus innings, allowing five runs, two earned, with eight strike outs to up his record to 5-1. Brady Martinez threw the final three innings to pick up his first save. Curtis had the first multi-homer game of his career, taking two over the wall, part of his five hit, seven RBI night. Curtis becomes the first Devil to have five hits in a game since Tuffy Gosewisch had five against Fullerton last season in the Super Regionals.
The Sun Devils got on the board in the third inning off Arizona starter Preston Guilmet. After Guilmet walked Seth Dhaenens and Ryan Sontag, he hung a ball to Colin Curtis, who took it over the wall in right field for a 3-0 ASU lead. Arizona State would add two more in the fifth to make it a 5-0 advantage. Eric Sogard scored Sontag with an RBI ground out, then Brett Wallace knocked home Sogard with a single up the middle.
Curtis broke out the whooping stick again in the sixth, taking Guilmet out to left center with a man aboard to make it 7-0 Devils. After Eric Sogard singled, Ike Davis would chase Guilmet from the game with his eighth home run of the year, a two-run shot to right. Those two RBI gave Davis 60 on the year, breaking his tie with Casey Myers for most runs batted in by an Arizona State freshman. Cory Burns took over for Guilmet and promptly gave up a solo shot to Brett Wallace that made it 10-0 ASU. The back-to-back bombs were the first for the Devils since March 13, 2005, when Tuffy Gosewisch and Jeff Larish pulled the feat against Western Illinois.
Colin Curtis would pick up his sixth RBI of the game in the seventh, singling home J.J. Sferra, who tripled down the right field line one batter earlier. Curtis would come around to score on a Wildcat error to make it 12-0 Arizona State.
Arizona would scratch five across in the seventh, thanks to a three ASU errors that led to three unearned runs. The Devils would answer right back in the eighth, thanks to RBI doubles by Willy Fox and Seth Dhaenens. Curtis would get his seventh RBI of the night on a single to center that made it 15-5. U of A would add one in the ninth, but it wasn't enough as ASU picked up the victory.
Five Sun Devils turned in multi-hit efforts, led by the five of Colin Curtis. All told, Arizona State rapped out 17 hits on the evening. Game two of the three-game series is tomorrow evening at 6 PM from Kindall Field.