Grand Canyon stuns Arizona in Tucson NCAA baseball regional

TUCSON — Two out, two strikes, bases loaded, a Hi Corbett Field record crowd of 8,798 screaming and waiting.

Eddy Pelc delivered in the biggest moment in Grand Canyon baseball history Friday night with a bases-clearing double over the center fielder’s head, fueling the Lopes’ first-ever NCAA regional victory, defeating host Arizona, the Tucson region’s No. 1 seed, 9-4.

Pelc’s hit gave GCU, the No. 4 seed, a 5-3 lead. He drove in another run in the eighth, and, just to make sure, Zach Yorke’s two-run double in the ninth sent the Wildcats into the loser’s bracket.

No. 3-seed West Virginia, which won its game earlier Friday, will meet GCU at 7 p.m., Saturday in the winner’s bracket. Arizona, the 13th overall seed in the 64-team NCAA Tournament, plays No. 2 Dallas Baptist at 1 p.m., Saturday for survival. The loser of that game will be eliminated.

Pelc’s hit came against Arizona’s hottest pitcher, Clark Candiotti, who had gotten into a groove after giving up an opening home run to Tyler Wilson and seeing another run cross the plate in the second.

But, after Arizona went up 3-2 against GCU left-hander Grant Richardson, the Lopes got their first hit since the second inning in the sixth when Yorke singled, after Candiotti walked Cade Verdusco.

Candiotti struck out cleanup hitter Eli Paton, before hitting Michael Diaz with a pitch. After getting Elijah Buries to look at a called third strike, it set the stage for Pelc with two outs.

“It was a high-pressure spot, a spot where we needed somebody to show up,” Pelc said. “I happened to be the guy to do it. I was trying to battle, put my best swing on the ball, stay in the box as long as I could and win that at-bat.”

After battling off pitch after pitch with foul balls, Pelc drove the ball. It appeared center fielder Brendan Summerhill took a step in before realizing how far Pelc hit Candiotti’s two-strike pitch. He watched the ball clear his head and off the wall, scoring three runs.

That gave GCU (35-23) a 5-3 lead.

Arizona (36-22) scored a run in the sixth after a Mason White double and an RBI single by Blake McDonald. Richardson then struck out Maddox Mihalakis with runners on the corners to end the inning.

That’s all Isaac Lyon, making a rare relief appearance, would need, pitching the final three innings of shutout ball for the lopes, giving up two hits and striking out four.

Lyon usually is the Saturday starter for GCU. But coach Gregg Wallis talked to pitching coach Nathan Bannister about having a lead in the seventh and how he wanted to go with Lyon to finish it out against the top seed in the regional.

“A tournament is different from the regular season,” Wallis said. “You can’t think traditionally. At least we didn’t want to think traditionally. We felt Isaac is one of our top two pitchers right now. We talked about it before the game, if we’re in the seventh inning and it’s tied or we have the lead, we’re going with Isaac.”

It paid off. And it made history for a team that a week ago was praying for a miracle to get into the NCAA Tournament, after getting knocked out of the WAC tournament with two losses in one day.

They only got in because WAC tournament winner Tarleton State wasn’t eligible because it was in the final season of the transition from D-II to D-I. That gave the regular-season champion, GCU, the automatic bid from the WAC.

It also gave the Lopes tremendous confidence knowing they were coming into Tucson, playing a team they had beaten two out of three times in the regular season with the last win coming a month ago, a 24-8 win at Hi Corbett Field.

Pelc said the team is playing with “house money.” Richardson was ecstatic to help give the program its first regional win, and in front of a sellout crowd.

“But we’re not done yet,” Richardson said.

Wallis said it was too soon to take in the historic moment for the GCU program. He was excited about the crowd, even though most of it was decked out in Wildcats’ red. He was excited for Wilson opening the game with a home run, for Richardson battling through UA’s three-run second after taking a hard liner off the knee, and for Pelc’s big hit.

Richardson ended up walking in a run after getting hit by the drive, but he got through the inning, and worked the next four innings, giving up just three hits and a run.

“I’m excited we came here and played great baseball,” Wallis said. “That’s what I told the boys after the game. I’m proud of them, not just because of what the scoreboard said. It was how we came out with intent to play great baseball. And we did it.”

Arizona coach Chip Hale said he hopes to see GCU again later in the tournament.

“We just didn’t play very well tonight,” Hale said. “They played well. They made the plays. They made some really hard ones. And we just didn’t play our best game.”

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