Gonzaga (7-18, 4-2 WCC) vs. Santa Clara (15-11, 3-3 WCC)
FRIDAY, APR. 5 | 6 P.M. | PATTERSON BASEBALL COMPLEX AND COACH STEVE HERTZ FIELD | SPOKANE
SATURDAY, APR. 6 | 6 P.M. | PATTERSON BASEBALL COMPLEX AND COACH STEVE HERTZ FIELD | SPOKANE
SUNDAY, APR. 7 | 12 P.M. | PATTERSON BASEBALL COMPLEX AND COACH STEVE HERTZ FIELD | SPOKANE
Gonzaga (7-18) vs. Washington State (16-11)
TUESDAY, APR. 9 | 6 P.M. | PATTERSON BASEBALL COMPLEX AND COACH STEVE HERTZ FIELD | SPOKANE
- Gonzaga welcomes Santa Clara for a three-game series Friday.
- GU is 60-48 all-time against the Broncos and 37-23 under Machtolf.
- Last season, GU was swept by Santa Clara on the road before dropping the West Coast Conference tournament opener in Vegas to the Broncos.
- Gonzaga is coming off a tough road trip at Saint Mary's and #5 Oregon State, losing the final four games of the trip while being outscored 47-8.
- Santa Clara is coming off a midweek loss to San Jose State and a series sweep at San Francisco last weekend. SCU is 3-3 in WCC play.
- The Zags will welcome Washington State for their first home midweek game of the 2024 season on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
- Gonzaga is 111-203-1 all-time against WSU dating back to 1911.
- Washington State will wrap up a three-game series at Stanford this weekend before making the short trip to Spokane on Tuesday.
- Gonzaga and Washington State's 316th meeting on Tuesday is the most between GU and any of their all-time opponents.
BULLDOGS/BRONCOS SERIES HISTORY
- Gonzaga and Santa Clara will meet for the 109th, 110th, and 111th times since 1970 this weekend when the Broncos travel to Spokane.
- Since 1970, Gonzaga owns a 60-48 series advantage over Santa Clara.
- Under Head Coach
Mark Machtolf, Gonzaga leads the series 37-23.
- Last season, Santa Clara swept Gonzaga down in the bay, before the Zags fell to the Broncos at the WCC tournament to end their 2023 season.
SCOUTING THE BRONCOS
- Santa Clara is coming off a midweek 11-8 loss at home against San Jose State.
- Last weekend, Santa Clara swept a series at San Francisco, 5-0, 2-1, 2-0. The Broncos are 3-3 in conference play after opening the WCC slate being swept by Portland at home.
- JonJon Berring leads the Santa Clara offense, batting .352 on the season with an OPS of 1.098, also leading the WCC in runs scored as a 2x Player of the Week.
- Efrain Manzo, who's slashing .347/.452/.693, leads Santa Clara in home runs (8), RBIs (29), and OPS (1.145).
- Santa Clara has a team ERA of 5.08, which is fourth-best in the West Coast Conference.
BULLDOGS/COUGARS SERIES HISTORY
- Gonzaga and Washington State will meet for an astounding 316th time when the Cougars travel to Spokane on Tuesday.
- Dating back to 1911, the Coug/Zag matchup has the most meetings among any Gonzaga opponent all-time.
- Washington State has the series lead, a 203-111-1 advantage.
- Under Machtolf, the Cougars hold a slight 32-30 edge over Gonzaga.
SCOUTING THE COUGARS
- Washington State will wrap up a three-game series at Stanford this weekend.
- Last weekend, the Cougars lost two of three at Washington, 4-0, 5-14, 5-11.
- Washington state is 6-6 in Pac-12 play, but their own series win came at Arizona State.
- Cole Kramer leads WSU in three major offensive categories, including average (.373), hits (38), and on base percentage (.443). His batting average ranks fifth in the Pac-12.
- Grant Taylor leads WSU in ERA (3.27) after throwing a one-hit shutout in game one at Washington where he set the school record with 17 strikeouts.
- Tri-cities native Chase Grillo is third in the Pac-12 with four saves to his name this year.
ON DECK
- After their four-game homestand, Gonzaga will hit the road for four games next week, starting with a three-game WCC series at San Francisco.
- The Zags will stop in Eugene for a midweek game at Oregon on April 16 before returning home for a three-game series against Portland April 19-21.
ZAGS SWEEP TO OPEN WCC PLAY
- For the fourth straight season, Gonzaga opened West Coast Conference play with a three-game sweep after defeating LMU 8-6, 7-6, and 10-5 last weekend at home.
- Loyola Marymount is the fourth different team Gonzaga has swept to open WCC play since 2021, sweeping San Francisco in 2023, Pacific in 2022, and Santa Clara in 2021.
- Gonzaga has not lost their first home WCC series since 2015 and are 20-4 in their first home WCC series over those eight seasons (2020 season cut short before WCC play).
SHUPE'S HOT RETURN
- In his return to the Gonzaga lineup since February 16th last weekend against LMU,
Hudson Shupe batted .727 and slugged 1.091 in GU's three-game WCC-opening sweep.
- In nine games, Shupe is batting .457 with two home runs, seven RBIs and ten runs.
- In game two against LMU, Shupe hit a walk-off two-run homer to clinch the series for GU.
- Shupe's 14-game hit streak was snapped in game one at Saint Mary's last Thursday.
TEMESVARY GETTING ON BASE
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Vincent Temesvary 's 17-game on base streak was snapped in game two of the Saint Mary's series last weekend. Over that streak, he led the team in average (.293), hits (17), RBIs (15), on-base percentage (.455), walks (12), and hit-by-pitches (6). His on-base streak is the longest Gonzaga streak this season, beating out
Peyton Miller (10) from earlier this year.
GONZAGA SNAPS ROAD WOES
- The Zags snapped a couple of road losing streaks with their series-opening win at Saint Mary's on Thurday. Prior to that game and dating back to last season, Gonzaga had lost 14 straight unranked road games and five straight WCC road games.
ZAGS WINS SERIES OVER MINNESOTA
- Gonzaga picked up their first series win of the 2024 season against Minnesota.
- The Zags and Gophers split the first two games before GU prevailed in the rubber match.
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Tommy Eisenstat led Gonzaga over the weekend, hitting .625 with five hits, four RBIs, and three runs scored in the two wins of the series.
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Michael Cunneely posted a quality start in Thursday's opener after posting seven-plus strong innings, surredering just three runs on four hits with seven strikeouts and no walks.
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Liam Paddack earned the win in Saturday's rubber match after working 4 2/3 innings in relief, giving up just one run on four hits, striking out six and walking none.
ZAGS UPSET NO. 6 VANDERBILT IN SERIES FINALE
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Jordan Hamberg's seventh-inning grand slam led Gonzaga to a 9-8 victory on Feb. 25.
- GU put up eight runs in the inning after taking advantage of two Commodore errors.
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Daniel Sotelo shut the door on the Zags' comeback win with three innings, giving up just one run on three hits, striking out two and walking none.
- Gonzaga's bullpen combined for eight innings, surrenduring just three runs on seven hits with four strikeouts and four walks in the series finale.
- Gonzaga's win marks their highest-ranked win since 2022 when they defeated No. 2 Oregon State in Corvallis.
