Utah Baseball Faces USC in Irvine This Weekend

Thursday, May 16

Irvine, CA

7:30 PM

University of Utah

USC

Photo by: Sophia Kuder/Utah Athletics

5/15/2024 2:32 PM | Baseball

Series opens Thursday night at Great Park

2024 Utah Baseball Game Notes
Games 51-53 Date // Time (MT)	Utah (32-18, 16-11 Pac-12) at USC (25-27, 14-12 Pac-12) Thursday, May 16 // 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 17 // 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 18 // 2 p.m.
Location	Irvine, Calif. (Great Park) *Note that this weekend's series will be played at Great Park in Irvine, due to construction at Dedeaux Field on the USC campus
Live Statistics	StatBroadcast Thursday // Friday // Saturday
Watch	USC Live Stream 3
Game Notes	Utah // USC // Pac-12 Weekly Release
@UtahBaseball Social Media	Twitter/X // Instagram // Facebook // #GoUtes // #UteNotes

The First Pitch: Things to Know
The final regular season series of the Pac-12 schedule takes the Utah Baseball team on the road, as the Utes meet USC in Irvine, California. The series is being played at Great Park due to construction on campus at USC's Dedeaux Field.

Utah enters the series in fourth place in the Pac-12 Conference standings, after a tiebreaker with third-place Oregon. Most recently, the Utes picked up a non-conference win over Utah Tech on Tuesday to bring the club to 32 wins—its most in the Pac-12 era.
The Utes continue to receive votes in the NCBWA poll; that run now sits at seven straight weeks (since April 1).
USC took two games in last year's meeting with Utah. The Utes are in search of a series win vs. the Trojans for the second time in the last three seasons; back in 2022 Utah took the first two games before falling 4-2 in the finale.
Last weekend saw Gary Henderson's club start its series vs. Arizona on a high note behind a complete game three-hitter from Bryson Van Sickle—the Pac-12 Pitcher of the Week. But the Wildcats came out on top Saturday to even up the series and took Sunday's rubber game at Smith's Ballpark.
Kai Roberts slashed .462 / .462 / .769 in the series vs. Arizona, including going 4-for-5 in the rubber game. He was a triple short of the cycle that night and has hit safely in 10 of Utah's last 11 games.
Van Sickle's series-opening effort vs. Arizona saw him allow just one run on three hits and two walks, striking out eight along the way. He became the first Utah pitcher since 2008 to have multiple complete games in a season and first to win two Pac-12 Pitcher of the Week awards since the Utes joined the conference.
The duo of Core Jackson and Roberts form two of the top-four batting leaders in the Pac-12. Jackson owns a .366 clip on the season, good for third in the league, while Roberts is narrowly behind him in fourth (.365).
The speedy Roberts owns both the single-season (30) and career (63) program records for stolen bases at Utah. His 30 bags this season are a Pac-12 best, 13^th in the nation. In his first three seasons combined, Roberts had 33 stolen bases. Jackson follows him on the Pac-12 season leaderboard with 17 stolen bases.
Roberts is among the Pac-12's best this season when it comes to hits (1^st; 77), doubles (3^rd; 19), RBI (4^th; 56) and total bases (3^rd; 123).
Entering the final stretch of the regular season, Utah remains one of the Pac-12's highest-scoring offenses at 7.3 runs per game. It's the third-most in the conference and continues a steady climb over the last three seasons. In part thanks to assistant coach Todd Guilliams' guidance, the Utes' production is up from 6.7 runs per game last season and 6.2 runs per game in 2022.
The Utah offense has struck out 340 times this season--the fewest of any Pac-12 offense and 37 less than the next-closest club. The team also takes the cake in conference play with 185 strikeouts sitting as the least by a Pac-12 team.
Utah's win in the Oregon series finale (May 5) gave the program its 30^th victory of the season. It came in a total of 45 games, the fastest in school history. Previously, the 1997 team held that record doing so by reaching the mark in 47 games. The 2002 Utes were the last team to reach the 30-win mark.
Following this weekend's series with the Trojans, Utah will head straight to Scottsdale, Arizona, for the 2024 Pac-12 Baseball Tournament. The tournament runs from May 21-25 at Scottsdale Stadium and seeding for the field will be finalized at the conclusion of this weekend's series throughout the league.