It’s hard to believe a program that lost last year’s Pac-10 Coach, Pitcher and Player of the Year — not to mention went through a tumultuous offseason — would be making history just months later.
But that is exactly what the ASU baseball team did Saturday night at Packard Stadium.
Behind a stellar pitching performance from junior Merrill Kelly and the first home run of freshman shortstop Deven Marrero’s career, the Sun Devils defeated California 6-1 to up their record to 22-0 to set a new mark for the best start in school history.
“This is a very storied program, and anytime you can have a record or a [can be a part of] history in this program, it’s not easy and it’s tough because of what’s been set before us,” ASU coach Tim Esmay said. “It’s an incredible feat.”
The new record for consecutive wins to start a season breaks the old mark of 21 set by the 1961 team led by legendary coach Bobby Winkles.
“I would hope that Coach Winkles would be proud of the continuation of the foundation that he laid,” Esmay said. “I hope that Coach Brock would be very proud of this, too, because a lot of that is how Coach Brock asked us to play, and Coach Murphy asked these guys to play the same way.
“What’s kind of nice about this program is success has been here for a long time, but if you really kind of break down how the success has been, there’s a template that everyone has kind of demanded each time.”
For the first half of Saturday’s contest, it was a classic pitchers’ duel, as Kelly and Cal freshman Justin Jones allowed just one hit each through four and a half innings.
But ASU struck for four runs in the fifth inning, highlighted by Marrero’s three-run long ball that was drilled over the left field wall.
“[Jones] was throwing changeups all day, I got my pitch and I hit it,” Marrero said. “That was his go-to pitch early in the count, and I just sat on that pitch, and luckily it went out. That felt amazing. I’ve been in a lot of very great atmospheres, and that was by far the best atmosphere I’ve been in. That was a great game, and I was glad to come out and perform.”
That turned out to be all the run support Kelly would need, as he gave up just one run — a solo shot to right field from Cal sophomore Danny Oh in the sixth inning — on two hits in 6 1/3 innings of work.
“It’s one of the best performances I’ve seen at Packard in a long time,” Esmay said. “He was definitely dominant. I just thought tonight he was in command from first pitch on. He was in command of the strike zone [and he] kept them off-balance. They really didn’t seem to take real good swings the whole night, and when you look at that, that’s somebody that’s in control.”
Thirteen of Kelly’s 19 outs came on the ground, and he added five strikeouts to record his team-leading sixth win of the season.
“Everything was working today,” Kelly said. “I think that was the biggest thing — every pitch I could throw whenever I felt like it, so I was able to keep the hitters off-balance. That was probably the biggest plus to the night.”
The Sun Devils added to their lead on a RBI single up the middle by sophomore first baseman Zach Wilson in the sixth and base hit by sophomore catcher Austin Barnes to score sophomore centerfielder Johnny Ruettiger in the eighth.
Sophomores Mitchell Lambson and Jordan Swagerty combined to strike out four in their 2 1/3 innings to finish off the game.
“It’s a real relief to come out of the game and know that someone’s coming in that’s going to shut the door,” Kelly said.
Jones lasted six innings in his first-ever Pac-10 start and was charged with five of ASU’s six runs. He struck out four but also walked six batters.
ASU will go for the sweep of the Golden Bears Sunday afternoon at Packard Stadium.
Reach the reporter at gina.mizell@asu.edu
