The BYU baseball team extended its streak to three consecutive wins with a 7-5 victory over Baylor on Tuesday afternoon.

BYU (3-4) dominated Baylor in almost every statistical category, recording 13 hits and one error compared with Baylor’s five runs, 10 hits and two errors.

The Cougar win earned the team some revenge after losing last year to Baylor, 7-6. The coaching staff attributed the win to the effort of the Cougar pitchers.

“Our pitching was outstanding,” BYU head coach Vance Law said in a news release. “[Shawn] Hardesty really picked it up and threw well.”

Hardesty, who picked up his first win of the year Tuesday, pitched five innings and struck out five players.

Offensively, the Cougars were able to produce hits in all but two innings, with the exception of the fourth and eighth innings. Infielder Brandon Relf led the team with four hits and three runs.
BYU scored one run in each of the first three innings, leaving the score at 3-2 by the end of the third. Hardesty held Baylor to five innings without any runs. The teams heated up in the seventh inning, with BYU scoring three and Baylor scoring one.

The Cougars’ seventh-inning hot streak began with utility player Dane Nielsen hitting a double. Two batters later, Relf also hit a double that brought Nielsen home. Following a change in Baylor’s pitcher, catcher-first baseman Alex Wolfe hit a single straight to center field, allowing Relf to score. The third run of the inning was scored by Wolfe, following a Baylor error.

Although Baylor did not record a hit in the seventh, the team acquired one run when infielder-outfielder Logan Vick scored as the result of a balk.

Baylor scored two runs in the ninth, while BYU’s outfielder Alex Hancock scored only one run, but the Bears weren’t able to come back from BYU’s big seventh inning.