Top-ranked Diamond Hogs keep Spartans’ spirit down in 22nd straight home win

BY DUDLEY E. DAWSON

FAYETTEVILLE – You’re probably going to win a lot of baseball games if only one of your foe’s batters touch third base during the contest.

That’s what happen Tuesday night at Baum-Walker Stadium as five  pitchers combined on a two-hitter and No. 1 Arkansas downed visiting San Jose State 5-1.

Ben Bybee started for Arkansas (28-3) and went the first five innings as the Razorbacks won for the x straight time overall and extended their stadium-record home victory  streak to 22. 

Wehiwa Aloy hit his team-leading ninth home run and joined Peyton Stovall in getting two each of their team’s nine hits.

“Hopefully we can keep it going,” Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn said. “These guys show up and they play. If we pitch good, and we field the ball pretty good, it’s been a good combination. Something like that, you can’t predict that, especially when you get into league play. It’s so hard to sweep anybody in league play. 

“If you’re playing a midweek game, you know, you can win a game or two there, but when you get into league play, it’s tough. Just proud of our guys for getting after it. Playing hard, and it’s a good number.”

The Razorbacks will look to sweep the two-game series from the Spartans Wednesday at 1 p.m., a game moved up two hours from its original start time and with Arkansas freshman pitcher Colin Fisher (5-1) slated to start.

It looks like it’s going to be lighter from 12 to 3 or 4 and then it jumps back in,” Van Horn said of rain. “Hey, if it doesn’t… We’ll take a shot. We’ll see what we can do. We’ll try to throw the first pitch around 1 is what we’re talking about. It looks like that’s what it’s going to be.”

Stovall’s RBI single tied it 1-1 in the third and hot-hitting Arkansas freshman Nolan Souza, batting second Tuesday night and now hitting .362,  followed with a two-run double to put his team up 3-1.

“It was a pretty long at-bat,” Souza said. “I was trying to fight off pitches. They weren’t really ones that I could get a real good swing on. I think I hooked a couple down the line. I was just sitting there waiting for him to throw me one that looked good. And he did. I just put a good swing on it.”

Ben McLaughin hit a solo homer in the third inning  before Aloy capped the scoring and continued his hot streak in the fourth inning while bouncing his home run off a window in Van Horn’s office beyond the field fence. 

Aloy’s batting average was .195 entering March and has now upped that to .299.

“Well, he’s really stayed in the zone,” Van Horn said of Aloy’s surge.“He’s been a lot more patient. He’s hitting the ball extremely hard the other way, as you saw the one he hit off my window. 

“I mean, that was beautiful. He knew it right when he hit it and it’s hard to the ball the other way that hard and he did it. Just staying in the zone, just kind of getting it going. It’s been fun watching him kind of climb the ladder a little bit.”

San Jose State took a 1-0 lead in the second when Matt Spears hit a home run  off Bybee, but Spears was the only San Jose State batter who made a trip around the bases.

“That pitch kind of made me mad,” Bybee said. “I just didn’t execute it. I threw it over the middle a little bit. I think it definitely made me really focus on executing my pitches and getting them to work. Getting them where they need to be. But yeah, I would say so.”

Th Spartans (12-20) had won four straight games, but head coach Brad Sanfilippo’s squad – who were an NCAA Tournament team last season, stepped up in weight class in this bout.

“They are obviously the No. 1 team in the country and we saw some high-level arms and up and down their lineup they’ve got high level baseball players,” Sanfilippo said.

“So I was happy with the effort that (starting pitcher) Keaton Chase gave us,” Sanfilippo said. “Obviously to score first, I thought that was great, but offensively we didn’t create enough with just two hits and not enough base runners to put the pressure on them that we would have needed to do to win this game tonight.

“I liked our effort. I like our compete. We did some really good things, but we have to do a better job of creating baserunners, grinding some at bats and just come back and play with the energy and effort we had today.”

Sanfilippo was pleased with his team’s mindset.

“We were not overwhelmed by the environment,” Sanfillippo said. “That is a really good baseball team on the other side. That goes without saying. I’m happy with our effort and I just look for us to get back at it and take another shot (Wednesday).”

Bybee (2-0) would go on to pitch five innings while allowing a run on two hits, striking out and not issuing a walk. 

He threw 55 pitches, 40 of them strikes, in his second start and appearance of the season after an injury and illness delayed the start of his 2024 campaign.

“I felt really good,” Bybee said. “I felt like every inning I was out there I just kind of got more comfortable, just kind of more dialed in. It felt really good to get some innings under my belt.

“Honestly, all my pitches were working tonight even through the fifth. I feel like it wasn’t until till probably the third inning where I felt like I was really confident in my changeup. That was what I kind of started throwing a lot of in the fourth and the fifth. Like I said, just felt really good.”

Christian Foutch and Gage Wood both pitched a hitless and scoreless inning each before Hunter Dietz came on to start the eighth frame.

Dietz would throw just 11 pitches and get one out before having to leave with an injury.

“They’re going to look at it,” Van Horn said. “But he got sore last time too. And it’s kind of in a strange area, a different area than where he had the surgery. So just let them look at it and figure it out.”

Stone Hewlett took over at that point and the fifth and final Arkansas pitcher of the night retired the final five San Jose State batters to finish off the contest.

“I thought Ben Bybee came out and pitched really well for us,” Van Horn said. “He had a good change-up, good breaking ball, fastball was good. Just really got us off to a good start. I know they hit a home run but sometimes that just happens.

“I really liked what I saw from our whole pitching staff. I thought Christian came in and threw great, Wood had a really good inning and then Dietz had a little soreness so we got him out of there. And then Hewlett came in and did a tremendous job. So, super job by our pitchers.” 

Photo by John D. James