Friday’s opening inning was a season first for Texas A&M.
No, it wasn’t the fact that it was one of the warmest days at Olsen Field since Opening weekend. Nor was it because the attendance for a Friday home game was the second lowest for a series opener — which can most likely attributed to spring break beginning for A&M students.
It was the first time that starting left-handed pitcher John Doxakis allowed two runs in the opening frame of the game this season. Despite No. 22 A&M’s efforts to conjure up some Olsen Magic, the Aggies fell to Gonzaga 6-4.
In the top of the third inning, Gonzaga added to its lead with a single off the bat of shortstop Josh Bristyan which allowed Austin Pinorini to score. An explosive third inning, which featured back-to-back doubles off the bats of Ernie Yake and Pinorini extended the Bulldogs lead to six.
A&M responded in the bottom half of the sixth inning. The first of two Aggie runs came off the bat of junior first baseman Hunter Coleman.
Two batters later, freshman third baseman Ty Coleman singled to left to score Cam Blake, who was standing on third base after he doubled and advanced to third on a wild pitch.
Doxakis was pulled from the game following a 4.0 IP performance, in which he gave up three runs on seven hits and struck out two of the 20 batters he faced.
“They more ready to go than we were to start the game, and got John Doxakis out after four innings,” A&M head coach Rob Childress said. “They did a great job against him, unlike nobody else has done this season or the end of last season.”
Doxakis said he was the only one to blame for the loss due to his inability to get his team started on the right foot.
“It was lack of focus, you know, not giving my team the chance to win in the beginning, not competing enough, and hats off to Gonzaga too,” Doxakis said. “We were making pitches and they were hitting them.”
According to Doxakis, the Gonzaga’s hitters were seeing everything he was throwing and connecting with it.
“Their two-strike approach was amazing, and not being able to get them on that slider throws you off sometimes, and they were ready to hit the mistakes you made, and that’s what they did the whole game,” Doxakis said.
Childress called sophomore right-handed pitcher Mason Cole to the mound in relief for Doxakis. Cole threw two complete innings giving up three runs with one strike out and one walk. Kyle Richardson came in to the game and pitched the seventh and eighth innings allowing one hit and four strikeouts. Bryce Miller closed out the game for the Aggies retiring the side.
A&M had multiple attempts later in the game to either tie the game or take the lead, however A&M failed to drive in the runs.
Junior Cam Blake said despite the inability to complete the comeback, the team’s morale never went down.
“We’re never out of the fight, we know that. We trust in each other,” Blake said. “We trust in our plan, so it doesn’t matter how much we are down, we’re just going to keep coming. We’re not playing the scoreboard, we’re playing for each other.”
The Aggies will play game two of the three game series tomorrow. First pitch is scheduled for 2:02 p.m.