ASU Baseball: Second shutout of weekend leads to sweep of Washington State

It might have been the warmest game of the season thus far and just like the state of Arizona, the Sun Devils are starting to heat up. Arizona State (15-5, 4-2 Pac-12) dominated in all aspects of its 9-0 win over Washington State (12-8, 1-5) on Sunday.

“The tendency sometimes on Sunday is things get a little sloppy or after two wins you get satisfied,” Arizona State coach Tracy Smith said. “What I liked is that there was no satisfaction with a two-game series win.”

ASU shut out a Pac-12 team twice in a series for the first time since 2012 (against Washington). On Sunday, it started with Justin Fall.

“I thought he was really competitive in the zone,” Smith said of Fall’s performance. “He set the tone early.”

Fall gave the Sun Devils 6.2 innings of work, while allowing the Cougars only two hits in the game and striking out five. He improved to 3-1 on the year and now holds a 2.16 ERA.

“I think if you prepare the right way, good results are going to happen,” Fall said. “It’s a good feeling to go out there, pitch well, and get the sweep.”

The offense was equally as explosive for Arizona State. The team totaled 24 runs scored on 29 hits. That included the three Sun Devils who had a multi-hit game in the finale; Joe Lampe (2-3, 2 RBI), Kai Murphy (2-4, 2 RBI) and Sean McLain (2-4).

In total, the Sun Devils had four innings of three or more runs. Two of those came on Sunday, when they scored four runs in both the first and sixth innings.

“We don’t let anything get us too up or too down,” shortstop Drew Swift said. “We just keep looking forward to keep doing the same things and keep competing.”

Swift and the rest of ASU now have the Arizona Wildcats to look forward to. The team from down south will travel to Phoenix Municipal Stadium for a three-game series starting on Thursday night at 6 p.m. local time.