Box Score San Luis Obispo, CA—The UC Riverside Baseball Team's offense hit a speed bump Saturday afternoon as Cal Poly's Jared Zill allowed just four hits over seven innings, and relievers Taylor Chris and Danny Zandona tossed two shutout frames en route to an 11-1 victory over the Highlanders.
UC Riverside (13-39, 2-19) collected its first hit of the day on a Joe Chavez double to start the third, but by then, the Highlanders trailed the Mustangs 2-0. Chavez eventually came home on an RBI ground out by Casey Henderson, but Cal Poly scored three more runs in their half of the third and one in the fourth off of Highlanders' starter Kevin Sprague (3-7).
Zill (4-1) didn't allow a second UCR hit until a two-out double by Edgar Morales in the top of the sixth. Morales and Vince Fernandez were both stranded in scoring position on Robby Witt's fly out to right.
Gabe Gentner, who came on in relief for the Highlanders in the fourth, allowed just one run in his 2.1 innings of work, but the Mustangs (26-25, 13-8) plated two runs off of Max Compton, and two more off of Matthew Ellis.
UC Riverside tried to rally in the top of the ninth, putting runners on the corners with two outs. Chavez worked the count full, but struck out swinging for the final out of the game.
The Highlanders conclude their 2015 season this week with a three-game series vs. UC Santa Barbara, The team will celebrate the careers of its six seniors prior to Saturday's season finale.