OMAHA — Like everyone else at Rosenblatt Stadium, UCLA’s Trevor Bauer was feeling the heat.
He said pregame warm-ups were almost intolerable. He gave up a homer in the first inning and had to work out of a mini-jam in the second. And it wasn’t long after that his sleeves — yes, the quirky sophomore was wearing a long- sleeved liner — were soaked through.
So don’t think the Bruins’ 10-3 win Saturday against Texas Christian was no sweat.
Sweet? Yes.
The Bruins, who hadn’t won a game in their two previous College World Series, are heading to the championship round after Bauer limited the Horned Frogs to four hits and struck out 13 in eight innings.
Blair Dunlap hit a three-run homer in UCLA’s five-run first, and the Bruins won going away.
“Obviously, that five-spot in the first inning was huge,” Bauer said. “It gives me confidence they have my back and simplifies your pitching approach. Throw strikes and don’t put people on base. In a tighter game you have to be more careful, and there’s higher stress. It’s huge when the offense can support you like that.”
UCLA (51-15) will play South Carolina (52-16), which beat Clemson 4-3, in the best-of- three finals starting Monday.
Aside from Bryan Holaday’s two home runs for TCU, Bauer (12-3) dominated a lineup that was batting a CWS-best .337. The Frogs, in the CWS for the first time, finished the season 54-14.
Bauer, with his fastball approaching the mid-90s, allowed only one baserunner after Holaday’s fifth-inning homer, and that was on a walk. He struck out the last four batters he faced before Daniel Klein came on to pitch a scoreless ninth.
Bauer and the Bruins weathered Omaha’s hottest day of the year.
The temperature was 94 degrees with a heat index, or feel-like temperature, of 107 degrees by the seventh inning.
A thermometer on the field measured the temperature at 109 degrees.
South Carolina 4, Clemson 3
Christian Walker homered and singled in the go-ahead run in the seventh inning as the Gamecocks staved off elimination a fourth straight time.
Clemson, the only team to make it to Omaha that wasn’t a No. 1 regional seed, finished 45-25.
Walker broke a 2-2 tie after Clemson intentionally walked Jackie Bradley Jr., who had knocked in nine runs in four CWS games. Walker sent Alex Frederick’s 3-1 pitch up the middle, scoring Evan Marzilli from third base. Adrian Morales followed with a single through the right side to put South Carolina up 4-2.
The Associated Press
