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Star-Bulletin Sports


Saturday, February 2, 2002


[ RAINBOW BASEBALL ]

art
GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hawaii pitcher William Quagileri struck out a career-high six batters in a career-high five innings pitched yesterday.



Quaglieri makes most
of relief stint


By Jerry Campany
jcampany@starbulletin.com

When Mike Trapasso took over the Hawaii baseball program, he didn't want to know what each of his new players had done last year, preferring to find out for himself.

That is how he found himself a potential starting pitcher sitting in his bullpen at Les Murakami Stadium last night.

UH William Quaglieri pitched five innings in relief of Ryan Yamamoto, exceeding the longest outing of his career by two innings and keeping Florida State from turning the game into a blowout.

"He (Quaglieri) was really the star of the game for us," Trapasso said. "He came in and threw strikes."

When Trapasso put Yamamoto in the rotation, he was asking the career reliever to make his first start in Honolulu since high school. He didn't care that the senior had only pitched 1013 innings in the past two years, and gave up 13 earned runs in those appearances.

He only cared that Yamamoto's stuff looked good in the bullpen and scrimmages, figuring that he had as much chance against No. 2 Florida State as any of his other pitchers.

"So many people came up to me in the past 24 hours asking why I'm starting Ryan Yamamoto," Trapasso said. "Same with Bryan Lee. I am going by what I see, and everything I've seen out of him has been positive."

But Trapasso had to take Yamamoto out of the game in the second inning, when he gave up four runs while facing only eight batters.

"There is probably a reason why he (Yamamoto) has not pitched that many innings," Trapasso said. "We have to find out that reason for ourselves."

When Yamamoto got into trouble, Trapasso also didn't care that Quaglieri had never pitched more than three innings in any college appearance. The sophomore looked plenty strong to him.

But just as Yamamoto pitched true to his previous form, Quaglieri exceeded the skipper's expectations.

Quaglieri got out of Yamamoto's jam in the second and proceeded to sit down the first eight batters he faced, striking out four of them. History knew that the sophomore could be effective, it just never said how long.

Quaglieri answered that question, going five innings and only giving up a pair of runs. When Trapasso asked him to stay in the dugout before the seventh inning, Quaglieri had thrown 67 pitches and struck out six Seminoles, including three in a row.

Trapasso has certainly not given up on Yamamoto after just one start, but knows that at least now he has one more option as he finds out what each of his pitchers is made of."

"We are nowhere near set in the rotation," Trapasso said. "Quaglieri starting is always a possibility. We are learning as we go."



UH Athletics
Ka Leo O Hawaii



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