The Rundown
LOS ANGELES - The University of San Francisco Dons (20-14, 10-3 WCC) baseball team dropped the first of a three game West Coast Conference series against Loyola Marymount (15-18, 8-5 WCC) in a back-and-forth game.
 
It would start brightly for USF as Jonathan Allen picked up where he started against Cal on Tuesday, leading off with a home run for the second consecutive game, making it 1-0. The Lions, however, would even the score in the bottom half of the first inning. LMU's Niko Decolati would reach second on an error from Nick Yovetich, he would score on the next at-bat through an RBI single.
 
USF would take the lead back in the third inning, which started with a Riley Helland one-out double. Michael Perri would move Helland over to third in the next at-bat with a ground ball to shortstop. Helland would cross home plate with Ross Puskarich up to bat through a wild pitch that got to the backstop, which was far enough for the junior to make it 2-1, Dons.
 
The Lions would take their first lead of the game in the fourth inning when Nick Sogard led off the inning with a single, Sogard was driven in a batter later by Trevin Esquerra who doubled to right center with one-out. After advancing to third on a wild pitch, Esquerra would score on a two-out single to center field, which gave the Lions a 3-2 lead.
 
In the fifth inning, USF would answer with a run of their own to even the game. Allen would step up to the plate with one out and swing at the first pitch, launching his second home run of the game to make it 3-3.
 
LMU would take their second lead of the game in the next inning on three straight hits. A one-out double started off the inning, then two consecutive singles by the Lions would drive in their fourth run of the game. The Lions would add another two in the seventh inning, getting the first two runners of the inning on base. Alex Pham would come in for the started, Thomas Ponticelli, and concede a single that drove in two to make the score 6-3, LMU. Helland would throw out the stealing runner at first and Pham would get the next two batters to keep the LMU lead at three runs.
 
The Dons would threaten in the eighth and ninth inning but were unable to get back into the game. With the loss tonight, USF are now 20-14 on the season and 10-3 in the WCC, which keeps them in first place in the league.

COACHES CORNER
USF head coach Nino Giarratano
On the overall performance
"Not being at the game (via suspension) was tough. Ponti(celli) wasn't sharp tonight and didn't have command of his slider, and that was probably the difference. After the lead off home run by Allen, we gave away the momentum with the error on the fly ball to allow them to extend the inning and score. Then we battled back to make it 3-3, but we just didn't make good pitches. We had Decolati 0-2 and gave up a double, and the rest was history for the game tonight. Credit to LMU, they really swung the bats well tonight."
 
On the offensive performance
"Jon (Allen) was good tonight. Unfortunately, we struggled with runners in scoring positon, not sure what we were tonight, and had we swung the bat better in those situations we get five or six runs. We probably should have given up four tonight at the worst, but we just couldn't make quality pitches when we needed to."
 
On bouncing back tomorrow
"You know, we haven't lost on a Friday yet in conference, so we'll be fine. There are a lot of ways to win the series. We'll battle back tomorrow with Ornido on the mound, and I'm sure we'll swing the bats well. We'll need to try to even the series tomorrow and go from there.
 
GAME STATS

• With his two home runs tonight, Allen now leads the team in that category with six.
• Allen, Helland, Puskarich and Winkler would account for eight of the Dons' 11 hits on the night.
• Allen now has 50 hits on the year, which extends his lead in that category.
• Pham threw two scoreless innings brings down his ERA to 3.20.