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The Arizona State baseball team lost both the three-game set and the Territorial Cup Series to the Arizona Sunday after dropping the finale, 7-6, to the visiting Wildcats.
Since the 2-1 series defeat was painful for a number of reasons, we at House of Sparky decided it would be best to do our series break down strictly by the numbers. Hopefully, along the way we'll find some redeeming stats as well:
7 - The number of ASU players to reach base in the 8th and 9th inning of Sunday's game without scoring - And due to the implications of that particular game, this statistic is undoubtedly the defining number of the series. It's also worth noting that Arizona State stranded five runners in the 8th and 9th innings of their 10-7 season-opening loss to the Wildcats on Friday.
47% - The portion of ASU's 32 hits that came from the top three batters in their lineup - While it's certainly encouraging to hear that Kasey Coffman, Michael Benjamin and James McDonald totaled 15 hits in the series, it's equally as unacceptable for a third of the lineup to be producing nearly half a team's hits. You aren't going to win many high scoring affairs that way, especially when the other six batters are busy compiling 13 of the team's 20 strikeouts in the series.
8 - The number of RBIs that 3B Michael Benjamin totaled in the series - Hitting from the two hole, the junior also chipped in with two runs to bring his season total up to a team-high 51. Benjamin also leads the Devils in average (.356), doubles (18), total bases (127) and slugging (.588).
10 - The number of runs allowed by Trevor Williams across six innings in his career-worst start - To his credit, only six of those runs were earned due to some shoddy defense (four errors). And Williams did manage to buckle down a bit considering nine of those runs were scored in the first three innings. But if that ends up being his last regular season home start of his ASU career, he should be disappointed. His breaking balls were simply refusing to break, which resulted in 12 hits allowed and two batters plunked.
4,105 - The number of fans who were in attendance to watch what was likely Williams' final home start - That total was a season-high until 4,304 showed up Saturday evening. Overall, ASU fans deserve some serious props for the support they showed this past weekend. Even with a worrisome number of Wildcat fans, the maroon and gold faithful still was mighty loud and mighty proud throughout the entire three-game series.
3-12 - Arizona State's record when trailing after six innings - The Devils did have a three-run eighth inning on Saturday to secure the victory but since that game was tied, it didn't effect this record. As sad as it is to admit, this weekend emphatically proved that the 2013 Sun Devil baseball team simply isn't built for late-inning comebacks.
32 - The number of appearances from LHP Matt Dunbar on the season - The senior reliever may have taken his first loss of the season Sunday by allowing the eventual game-winning run but Dunbar is still pitching at a record-setting pace. He's already tied for the 10th most single-season appearances in ASU history and could certainly climb higher with four regular season games left to play.
Speaking of games left to play, the Sun Devils will take the field again Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. PT for their final non-conference game of the season against BYU. After that, they hit the road for three-game weekend set against in Washington against the Huskies. Stay plugged into House of Sparky for continued baseball updates as ASU looks to wrap up its regular season in style.