Arizona baseball drops series opener at Washington State, extending Pac-12 road skid

The road remains unkind to Arizona.

The Wildcats dropped their 11th consecutive conference road game on Friday night, falling 6-3 at Washington State in the opener of a 3-game series.

Arizona (17-14, 5-11 Pac-12) had its 3-game win streak snapped and fell to 1-5 this season in series openers in conference play. It outhit the Cougars 11-8 but left right runners on base, while WSU took advantage of five walks and three hit batters.

Like it had in its previous six league road games, Arizona had the lead early. Twice, actually.

The first three batters singled for the UA in the top of first to go up 1-0. Then, after WSU scored twice in the bottom of the second, the Wildcats retook the lead in the fourth via an RBI double from Emilio Corona and a run-scoring single by Tyler Casagrande.

Freshman Jackson Kent, making his first career start, went 4.1 innings but left with the tying run on second in the fifth for TJ Nichols. Nichols threw four shutout innings of relief last Friday, but this time his control was nowhere to be found.

The junior walked four and hit two, including the first batter he faced on an 0-2 pitch. He walked in the tying run, then the go-ahead run came home on a fielder’s choice.

Nichols would load the bases with two out in the seventh on two walks and another HBP, this one on an 0-2 count, with two of those runs coming in on a single after Eric Orloff replaced him.

Mac Bingham had three hits while Tony Bullard and Nik McClaughry added two each for the UA.

Lefty Bradon Zastrow will go for Arizona in the second game Saturday at 12 p.m. PT