TCU baseball drops opener to Texas Tech in Big 12 showdown

When Texas Tech got its shot at the TCU bullpen, it didn’t go to waste.

Right fielder Stephen Smith tripled in a four-run sixth inning that included two errors, and Eric Gutierrez hit his eighth home run in the seventh in the Red Raiders’ 7-3 victory Friday night in the opener of a three-game series at Lupton Stadium.

The win assured Tech (33-12, 13-3), now three games ahead of TCU (29-11, 10-6), will leave Fort Worth still in first place in the Big 12.

TCU managed only three hits through the first seven innings, losing a Friday night series opener for the fifth time and a Big 12 game at home for the first time.

“They outplayed us in every phase of the game — starting pitching, defense, timely hitting,” TCU coach Jim Schlossnagle said.

Texas Tech got going on Tyler Floyd’s five-pitch walk to lead off the fifth inning against Brian Trieglaff (4-1), who took over for Dalton Horton.

No. 9 hitter Trey Ochoa sent a hit-and-run ground ball to shortstop, but Ryan Merrill was covering the bag and couldn’t reach back in time to get the ball cleanly. Instead of a double-play chance, the Horned Frogs were stuck with two runners on and no outs, and another walk loaded the bases.

Trieglaff got a double play and a pop-up to end the inning, but Tech had the lead at 2-1.

There was no escape in the sixth.

Two singles and an error — on a ball to shortstop that appeared to be shielded from Merrill’s view by the base runner — got the score to 3-1 with no outs, and Trieglaff’s throwing error to first on a tapper in front of the mound scored another run for a 4-1 lead.

After a pop-up and a fielder’s choice to the plate, Stephen Smith’s triple to center made it 6-1.

“We had a chance for a double-play ball, but even the outs they made the whole game, until [Drew] Gooch came in, were hard,” Schlossnagle said. “It wasn’t like we were pitching lights out. We were lucky to be in the game when Trieglaff came in.”

Gutierrez’s leadoff home run in the seventh against Gooch made it 7-1.

Tech right-hander Davis Martin (7-0) got 16 of the first 18 outs on ground balls, allowing only two hits and two walks through the first six innings.

Elliott Barzilli’s home run to lead off the seventh for TCU was the first ball in the air to the outfield against the Tech freshman.

Horton went four innings in his start for the Horned Frogs, allowing a run on five hits and striking out one. He gave up a sacrifice fly in the fourth and left the game after 65 pitches. TCU had been unbeaten in his starts.

“He was throwing the ball around the plate, but they had a lot of hard outs,” Schlossnagle said. “I thought he was living on the edge the whole time. They had all those right-handed hitters in there. Trieglaff has pitched well at times for us, and I thought we just needed to change the mojo of what was going on. And he goes out there and walks the leadoff hitter.”

Backup catcher Zack Plunkett pitched the ninth for TCU, giving up two hits and no runs, helping preserve five other bullpen arms for the rest of the series.

Dane Steinhagen had an RBI single in the TCU ninth to score Connor Wanhanen, who had doubled.

This story was originally published April 29, 2016 at 11:47 PM with the headline "TCU baseball drops opener to Texas Tech in Big 12 showdown."