Friday, February 13, 1998
Crawford settles down,
beats Base’Bows
Florida State churns out
By Al Chase
'seeing-eye' hits
Star-BulletinSkip the first inning. Neither starting pitcher was a ball of fire. Florida State left-hander Wes Crawford began to straighten his act out in the second inning.
University of Hawaii sophomore left-hander Dusty Bergman must have forgotten his lines.
However, when it came to keeping the ball within the lines, the No. 18 Seminoles (6-3) made excellent use of what head coach Mike Martin called "seeing eye" hits.
The final curtain fell with FSU taking the second game of the series, 11-2, before 950 fans at Rainbow Stadium last night.
Crawford pitched eight innings, scattered nine hits, walked just two and struck out seven.
Martin challenged his 6-foot-3 sophomore in the eighth inning when the Rainbows (11-3) loaded the bases on a walk, Darren Blakely's single and an error.
"He told me to bear down, to show him something," Crawford said.
"We wanted eight innings from him," Martin said. "You hate to use somebody with two more games. Now our bullpen is in good shape for those games.
"He kept his composure well after the first and pitched an extremely good game."
Crawford said his rough start was due to not feeling quite ready coming out of pregame warmups. Once he got into the groove in the third and fourth innings, the fastball, change-up and curve were all working.
Hawaii pitching coach Carl Furutani said Bergman's mechanics were terrible.
"His approach was messed up and he couldn't make the adjustment," Furutani said. "We're not where we can miss a start (Bergman missed his start last week) and miss repeating actions.
"It's not a big thing, but we have to take care of it. We've got a lot of work to do this week."
"This team has gone the way the pitching has gone, I don't know if it's FSU or not," UH catcher Lars Hansen said.
Wednesday night, Florida State played with the Rainbow Stadium alleys. Last night, they picked on the corners.
The Seminoles put the game away with three runs in the fifth and three more in the sixth.
A walk and Kevin Cash's single set the stage for Brian Cox's run-scoring double into the left-field corner in the fifth inning.
In the sixth, George Otero started things with another double down the left-field line. Brett Groves drilled Kamuela Binkie's next pitch inches inside the first base bag for a run-scoring triple into the right-field corner.
One batter later, Jose Zabala followed his cue and drove Groves home with a double into the left-field corner.
When a team is winning, the little errors that hurt are often masked.
As Furutani pointed out, the coaches now have examples they hope will help make the players believers in what the coaches are saying.
And, there are only five more games before the Western Athletic Conference season starts.
INTERESTING: In the two games, 10 of Florida State's 21 hits have been for extra bases. Only one of Hawaii's 19 hits -- a bloop double by Blakely last night -- has been for extra bases.
Box Score
Seminoles 11, Rainbows 2
Florida State Hawaii ab r h bi ab r h bi Badeaux 2b 4 1 1 0 Blakely cf 4 1 2 0 Zabala 3b 3 3 1 1 Honma rf 4 1 2 0 Cash dh-1b 4 2 2 2 Aloy 1b 5 0 0 1 Salazar c 4 0 2 2 Hansen c 2 0 0 1 Proctor pr 0 1 0 0 Stegmaier c 2 0 1 0 Cox cf 5 1 1 1 Wheeler 3b 3 0 1 0 M. Diaz rf 4 0 1 1 Whitsett lf 3 0 1 0 Henderson rf 0 1 0 0 Martin lf 2 0 1 0 Woodward 1b 3 0 0 0 Nakano dh 3 0 1 0 Mayfield ph 1 0 0 0 Konishi dh 2 0 0 0 Klosterman c 1 0 1 1 Perreira 2b 3 0 0 0 Otero lf 2 1 2 0 Chan 2b 2 0 0 0 Heath lf 1 0 0 1 Dartt ss 3 0 1 0 Groves ss 4 1 1 1 Pico ss 0 0 0 0 Totals 36 11 12 10 Totals 38 2 10 2 Florida State 201 033 002--11 Hawaii 200 000 000-- 0E--Badeaux (4), Groves (3), Bergman 2 (2), Dartt (10), Wheeler (4).DP--FSU 1 (Badeaux-Groves-Woodward), UH 1 (Wheeler-Aloy). LOB--FSU 7, UH 15.
2B--Cox (3), Klosterman (1), Otero (2), Zabala (2), Blakely (2). 3B--Groves (1). SB--Blakely (13), Honma (9). SF--Cash (2), Heath (1), Salazar (1).
IP H R ER BB SO Crawford (W, 2-0) 8 9 2 2 2 7 DiBlasi 1 1 0 0 0 2 Bergman (L, 2-1) 4-2/3 4 6 3 3 0 Binkie 1 5 3 3 0 1 Baptista 1-1/3 0 0 0 0 0 Sakaino 1-1/3 3 2 2 1 0 Mackenzie 1 0 0 0 0 0WP--Bergman 2 (5), Sakaino (2). Balk--Crawford (1). HBP--Blakely, Wheeler and Hansen (by Crawford), Otero (by Bergman), Henderson (by Sakaino), Wheeler (by DiBlasi).Umpires--Tomaszewski (plate), Montalbo (bases). T--2:59. A--950.
Rainbow Men Baseball Schedule
http://uhathletics.hawaii.edu
