The Sacramento State baseball team took their last, long road trip of the season this past weekend as they dropped two of three games to Washington State at Bailey-Brayton Field.

The Hornets dropped the first game on Friday as they were not able to match run for run with the Cougars in a 17-11 loss. WSU assaulted the Hornets’ pitching staff by producing 20 hits.

“Friday was a case where we just couldn’t stop the bleeding,” head coach John Smith said. “We’d score, then they’d score. They just had a little bit more.”

The Cougars’ offense got started early and countered a two-run Hornet first inning with three runs in the bottom of the first and another run in the bottom of the second to take a 4-2 lead.

WSU put up five runs in the third inning, four in the fifth, one in both the sixth and seventh and two in the eighth.

The loss brought an end to the Hornets’ season-high four-game road winning streak, but the game also saw senior Tim Reimer increase his season-long hitting streak to 10 games.

Saturday’s game brought much of the same offensive output from the Cougars. The same could not be said for the Hornets.

The Cougars feasted on Sac State pitching and put up double-digit runs for the second day in a row as they defeated the Hornets 14-5.

Sac State got out to a 5-0 lead after three innings, but weren’t able to muster any more runs or avoid the onslaught.

Freshman Mel Cuckovich pitched well early, but was tagged with the loss (0-2) after giving up six runs in 5 1-3 innings. The bullpen was shelled for the other eight runs, including five runs in the bottom of the eighth inning that put the game out of reach.

Sunday brought a much “sunnier” outcome for the Hornets in a 15-14 see-saw-win that was called after seven innings because of rain.

The first two games of the three-game set saw the Hornets strike first, only to lose the lead and the game on both occasions. This time, the Cougars drew first blood with two runs in the first inning.

The Hornets answered with a vengeance in the top of the second. They would touch home seven times to take a 7-2 lead after the second. The seven runs were produced with just two swings of the bat.

The first four runs came off the bat of sophomore Brett LeVier, when he hit a grand slam to bring home juniors John Acha and Bobby Ciani and sophomore Matt Wilson.

Later in the inning, Olsen hit a three-run homer to open up the Hornet lead to five runs.

However, the Cougars scored six times off Hornet starter James Wheeler and reliever Joe Guntz to take the lead, 8-7.

They would add to the advantage with another two runs in the third.In the top of the fourth, Olsen added a fifth RBI to his day’s total as he tripled in Everett Rincon. Ciani later doubled in a run and LeVier hit into a fielder’s choice that scored an additional run, putting the Hornets ahead, 11-10.

Once again, the lead would not hold up for long.

The Cougars scored two runs and recaptured the lead at 12-11 in the bottom of the fourth.

In the fifth, the Hornets took the lead for good as they plated three runs to take a 14-12 lead. Schmidt, Acha and Ciani each had RBI hits in the inning.

The Hornets would add one more run in the seventh. Junior Marshall Plouffe pitched the final four innings of the rain-shortened game to up his record to 6-2 on the year and Reimer singled in the first to extend his hitting streak to 12 games.

The Hornets moved to 31-23 after the weekend in Washington and have three games left in their season, a home series with San Francisco beginning on Thursday at 2:30 p.m.

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