Gutierrez, Dugger Lift Texas Tech to 3-1 Win Over East Carolina

Saturday, June 11

Lubbock, Texas

TBA

Texas Tech Athletics

45-18

East Carolina

38-22-1

Texas Tech

East Carolina

Gutierrez, Dugger Lift Texas Tech to 3-1 Win Over East Carolina

June 11, 2016 | Baseball

Box Score Box Score Postgame Notes

Eric Gutierrez laced a two-out, two-run single to left field to break a 1-1 tie in the 13th inning.

By: Texas Tech Athletics Communications

LUBBOCK, Texas – Eric Gutierrez delivered a clutch two-out, two-run single in the 13th inning, and Ryan Dugger fired five innings of shutout relief to vault Texas Tech to a dramatic 3-1 win victory over East Carolina on Saturday as a program record 4,817 fans gathered at Dan Law Field at Rip Griffin Park.

The victory enabled Texas Tech (45-18) to force a winner-take-all game three with the Pirates (38-22-1). The 13-inning game was the longest in Tech postseason history and tied for fourth-longest in the NCAA Super Regional Round.

The Red Raiders put together some two-out magic in the 13th inning. Tyler Floyd battled back from a 1-2 count to draw a walk. He advanced to third base courtesy of an Orlando Garcia single through the right side. Stephen Smith kept the frame alive and coaxed a five-pitch walk to load the bases.

Gutierrez, the 2016 Big 12 Player of the Year and a first team All-America honoree, provided the heroics and ripped a two-run single through the middle on a 1-0 offering for his first hit of the super regional.

Robert Dugger (5-0) worked a 1-2-3 home half of the 13th inning, the final two outs coming on ground balls to second baseman Michael Davis. He logged five innings of two-hit relief and posted a career-high tying five strikeouts against two walks.

Dugger entered the contest with the score tied at 1-1 and ECU runners on first and second base with no outs in the ninth inning. He induced a pair of fly outs and got a strikeout looking to end the Pirates threat. The junior right-hander hasn't surrendered a run in eight of his last 10 appearances out of Tech bullpen.

ECU stranded six of its 14 runners left on base in the ninth inning on as the Pirates left the winning run on third in the 11th and then the bases loaded in the 12th. The Red Raiders also struggled to score runners as Tech left a season-high 15 on base.

The Red Raiders opened with an early one-run lead on a Michael Davis RBI infield single in the fourth inning. He scored Tyler Neslony on the sharply-hit ball up the middle after Neslony connected on a one-out double earlier in the frame.

The Pirates tied the game two innings later off a Travis Watkins sacrifice fly that plated Charlie Yorgen after a leadoff hit-by-pitch to start the sixth. The RBI was Watkins seventh already in the super regional.

Tech came close to breaking up the tie in the ninth on a Tanner Gardner single that bounced off the glove of first baseman Bryce Harman and rolled down the right-field line. Tyler Floyd tried to score on the play from second but he was called out at the plate to end the inning.

Gardner led the Red Raiders at the plate, finishing 3-for-6 overall for his team-leading 26th multi-hit game of the season. He is hitting .545 for the series (6-for-11) with three hits in both games this weekend.

East Carolina reliever Joe Ingle tossed five shutout innings out of the bullpen before Sam Lanier relieved him to start the 13th inning. Lanier (2-2) took the loss for the Pirates as he surrendered two runs off two hits in just two-thirds of an inning.

Sunday's game three is on-tap for a 2 p.m. CT first pitch on either ESPNU or ESPN2.