Baseball Falls to Arizona

Cardinal season record drops to 31-7-1.

April 17, 1998

TUCSON, Ariz. - Senior Arizona left fielder Jason Hendricks won the battle of national player of the year candidates with Stanford's Jeff Austin, homering and driving in three runs off the junior right- hander and leading the Cats to a 9-5 victory over the top-ranked Cardinal here Friday night.

The Cats improved to 29-18 with the win and clinched their second-consecutive winning record. UA's record in Pac-10 South play moved to 9-13. Stanford dropped to 31-7-1 and 14-5.

Earlier this week, Hendricks and Austin were named two of 12 semifinalists for the Rotary Smith Award, given annually to the nation's top collegiate baseball player. Hendricks' two-run shot in the fifth inning broke open a 4-3 game. He then capped the game's scoring with a run-scoring single in the seventh. Austin (9-2), who won his first nine decisions before losing to California last week, gave up season-highs in hits (11), runs (9) and earned runs (8) in 6.2 innings of work.

Junior lefty James Johnson (6-3) won his second consecutive start with 6.2 solid innings of work, striking out seven. He became the first Wildcat pitcher since Mike Schiefelbein in 1992 to strike out 100 batters in a season. Junior left-hander Ryan Moskau threw 2.1 innings of one-hit relief and worked out of a bases-loaded jam in the eighth to earn his sixth save of the year.

The two teams will meet again Saturday night at 7 p.m. at Sancet Field.

#1 Stanford   100   200   200 - 5   8    4
Arizona       130   200   30x - 9   12   1

Austin, Coose (7), Cogan (8) and Salter; Johnson, Moskau (7) and Clark.
W-Johnson, 6-3.
L- Austin, 9-2.
Sv-Moskau (6).
HRs-Stanford, Gerut (13); UA, Hendricks (14).