Salt Lake City, UT—The UC Riverside Baseball Team got six strong innings from starter Keaton Leach Sunday afternoon as the Highlanders closed their three-game series at Utah with a 5-3 victory.

Leach (1-0) made his first start of the season and allowed just four hits and no walks while his offense staked him to a 4-1 lead. Michael Farris drove in the Highlanders first run with an RBI ground out in the third, and two batters later, Vince Fernandez made it 2-0 UCR with an RBI single to right.

The Utes cut the lead in half in their half of the third, but the Highlanders (14-19) extended their advantage in the fourth on a Casey Wordan single which scored Thomas Walker.

UCR made it a 4-1 game in the sixth without the benefit of a base hit. With one out in the inning, Thomas Walker reached on a two-base fielding error by the right fielder. After AJ Sawyer ground out to third, Worden struck out for what should have been the third out of the inning, but the pitched ball was well off the mark, and Worden reached on the wild pitch. Walker advanced to third on the play, and came home on another wild pitch with the Highlanders fourth run of the game

Leach was lifted at the start of the seventh in favor of Alex Fagalde, and in the top of the eighth, UC Riverside plated another unearned run to go up by four.

Utah (13-19) scored two runs in their half of the eighth, but Ryan Lillie pitched a scoreless ninth to earn his third save of the season.

The Highlanders remain on the road this week traveling to San Diego Tuesday for a 6 pm PT first pitch against the Toreros. They return to conference play on Friday, welcoming Long Beach State to The Plex for a three-game series.