It may not have been Trevor Williams’s most dominating start, but it was enough Friday night as the No. 9 ASU baseball team scored a season high in runs in a 16-3 win over Valparaiso.
The junior pitched six innings, allowing three runs on nine hits, to pick up his fifth win of the season.
Williams walked three and struck out only one. He said he was fighting through some adversity with his pitches.
“Stuff-wise, I don’t think it was my greatest stuff,” Williams said.
Williams said he had been working all week with his mechanics and that Friday’s start was not only a struggle physically.
“These are the days where you’re working,” Williams said. “You’re not just cruising through innings and stuff. These are the days you truly become a pitcher.”
Williams was hit hard early on, including taking a ball off the back in the first inning.
“They were putting the bat on the ball and balls were getting through,” Williams said.
The Crusaders (14-22, 4-8 Horizon) struck first in the third with two runs, but the Sun Devils (23-11-1, 8-7 Pac-12) responded with three in the bottom of the inning and never trailed again.
The Sun Devils managed to tie a season-high with 19 hits, including three apiece from junior third baseman Michael Benjamin and freshman designated hitter R.J. Ybarra.
Redshirt sophomore outfielder Trever Allen hit his team-leading seventh homerun of the season to lead off the bottom of the eighth inning to put the Sun Devils up 8-3.
The Sun Devils didn’t stop there and brought around eight more runs in the inning to put the game away.
”That’s just how eighth innings have been all year with us,” Williams said. “Either we have a lot of runs against us or a lot of runs for us.”
In total, nine different Sun Devils recorded an RBI during the game.
The teams return to action tomorrow night for the second game of the series.
Reach the reporter at dsshapi1@asu.edu
