Arizona baseball clinches first series win at Washington since 2012

Winning in Seattle has not been easy for Arizona, where since 2000 it had gone 10-20 against Washington entering the weekend.

But after winning the first two games of their Pac-12 series, including Saturday’s 6-2 victory, the UA has a chance to pull off its first-ever road sweep of the Huskies. Arizona (20-7, 8-3) has already locked up its first road series win at Washington since 2012, when it went on to win the College World Series.

Arizona scored four runs in the final two innings to break a 2-2 tie, continuing its season-long dominance in the late innings. Tommy Splaine gave the Wildcats the lead with a 2-out RBI single in the top of the 8^th, then Noah Turley added a 2-run double to make it 5-2.

The UA has outscored its opponents 76-30 in the seventh and eighth this season.

Nik McClaughry added an insurance run with a solo home run in the ninth, his first of the season and second of the game for Arizona. Splaine homered in the 2^nd, and his RBI groundout in the 4^th tied the game at 2.

Splaine was 2 for 4 with three RBI, while McClaughry and Mac Bingham also had two hits.

Right-hander Chris Barraza picked up the win by throwing a scoreless seventh after lefty Garrett Irvin went the first six. Irvin allowed six hits and two unearned runs, both coming in the bottom of the third when Washington (14-12, 5-6) had three hits but not were hit particularly hard.

Lefty Holden Christian threw the final two innings for his fifth save.

Arizona can go for the sweep, its first on the road in Pac-12 play since the final weekend of the 2019 season, at 1 p.m. PT Sunday. Freshman righty Anthony Susac will be on the mound for the Wildcats.