USC’s impressive streak continued this past weekend. The Trojans, led by head coach Andy Stankiewicz, won the three-game series against UCLA 2-1, their eighth consecutive series win this season.
In other words, the Trojans have not lost a three-game series since being swept by Oregon in early March. Their most recent victim, UCLA, is none other than the team currently in second place in the Big Ten Conference.
The Heroes of USC Winning Streak
Of course, a streak like this has more than a few heroes, and the hosts of the D1Baseball podcast devoted several minutes of their latest edition to recognizing some of them.
“To win eight straight series, I don’t care who you’re playing,” Kendall Rogers said, “that’s incredibly impressive. They played a pretty solid non-conference schedule, got some really nice wins in conference, you know, [LHP] Caden Hunter and [RHP] Caden Aoki have done a really nice job in their weekend rotation this year. [C] Augie Lopez had some big hits for the Trojans over the weekend against the Bruins.”
It is no coincidence that the expert mentioned these three players. Aoki has five wins and two losses with a 4.25 ERA in 12 games (72 innings) as a starter this season. He has struck out 69 batters with only nine walks.
As for Hunter, he has started 11 games with five wins and three losses. His ERA is 5.18 and he has 60 strikeouts in 57.1 innings.
Lopez, meanwhile, got the opportunity to play against UCLA and made the most of it. He finished the weekend with five hits in 8 AB, with six RBI and a walk.
Rogers, however, take a moment to note the commendable work of the coaching staff under Andy Stankiewicz:
“The elite coaching staff that they [USC] have, I mean, you talk about [head coach] Andy Stankiewicz, but let me name off the assistants on the staff: Sergio Brown, Sean Allen and Travis Jewett,” Rogers said.
“I mean, that is an elite staff,” he added. “‘Big Jewett’, from his time at Vanderbilt and Arizona State, obviously Washington State, Sergio was kind of the architect behind a lot of those great Fullerton teams on the recruiting trail, and Sean Allen was an assistant of the year at D1Baseball at one point.”
“I mean, one, what they’ve done is impressive, but two, give the staff a lot of credit. That’s a really good staff that Andy’s put together and they’re doing a great job.”
KEEP READING: 7 Best College Baseball Teams That Didn’t Win the College World Series
Without a doubt, both the players and the coaching staff have done an outstanding job this season, and the results speak for themselves. USC currently sits tied for third place in the conference with a 16-8 record and a 32-15 overall record, and they have a good chance of making the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2015.
However, they still have two tough bones to crack as they close out the regular season against Washington and Michigan State, fourth and fifth in the Big Ten Conference, respectively.
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