SACRAMENTO, Calif. – The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Vaqueros baseball team reached 20 Western Athletic Conference (WAC) wins for the first time in program history by closing out the regular season with a 4-2 victory over the Sacramento State Hornets on Saturday at John Smith Field.
 
UTRGV (29-24, 20-15 WAC) opens the WAC Tournament as the No. 3 seed with a first round matchup against No. 6 seed Utah Valley on Wednesday at 4 p.m. at Hohokam Stadium, the spring training home of the Oakland A's, in Mesa, Ariz. Fans in the United States can watch online via ESPN+. Fans outside the United States can watch online at WACDigitalNetwork.com.
 
UTRGV is 3-1 against Utah Valley this year, winning the first two games 6-1 and 5-4 in seven innings, dropping the third game 6-5 in 11 innings, and winning the finale 6-2 in 10 innings.
 
Graduate student Andy Atwood led the Vaqueros in this game by doubling twice and scoring once. Graduate student Coleman Grubbs preceded each double with a single, scoring twice. Graduate student Joseph Impeduglia also doubled twice.
 
Down 2-0 in the sixth, the Vaqueros tied the game as Grubbs led off with a single and then Atwood doubled. Sophomore Diego Ramirez and junior Freddy Rojas Jr. followed with RBI-groundouts to make the score 2-2.
 
The eighth played out in similar fashion, with Grubbs leading off with a single and then Atwood hitting a double againstTravis Martizia (2-3). Ramirez followed with an RBI-groundout to give the Vaqueros a 3-2 lead.
 
The Vaqueros added an insurance run in the ninth on a suicide squeeze by postbaccalaureate student Christian Sepulveda.
 
That made a winner of junior Ricky Gerik Jr. (5-3), who pitched 1.1 innings of scoreless relief.
 
Senior Chase Bridges pitched a scoreless ninth for his third save.
 
Sophomore J.C. Ariza started for the Vaqueros, striking out five and allowing two hits and one walk in 4.0 scoreless innings.
 
The Hornets (34-20, 22-14 WAC) snapped the scoreless tie in the fifth when, with the bases loaded and nobody out, Chris Gonzalez hit into a fielder's choice to bring a run home. Then, after a hit batsman reloaded the bases, Logan Denholm got plunked to force-in a run to make the score 2-0.

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