Brandon Wulff knew he could produce this type of game. All he needed was to get back to basics.
Wulff drove in four runs, Alex Dunlap drove in three and the Stanford baseball team beat visiting USC, 8-1, in a Pac-12 Conference contest Sunday at Sunken Diamond.
Wulff had a tough series against Washington State last weekend so he spent extra time this week with assistant coach Brock Ungricht getting his swing in order.
“I worked to get my swing back to where it was,” Wulff said. “I was hoping for this.”
Wulff opened the scoring with a sacrifice fly to center field, which helped set the tone the rest of his at bats.
“A 3-0 count, 95 percent of the time it’s going to be a fastball,” he said. “I just wanted to put a good swing on it.”
He delivered solid singles up the middle in each of his next three at bats. Dunlap twice followed him with run-producing hits, singling in a run in the fourth and doubling in two more in the fifth.
Tommy Edman added three hits and drove in a run.
Menlo school Mikey Diekroeger continued his torrid hitting, collecting a pair of doubles among three hits. He also scored three times. He’s 6-for-8 with seven runs scored the past two games.
Brett Hanewich (3-1) was effectively wild, hitting five batters and walking three but also inducing five double play balls and striking out five. He gave up an unearned run on four hits over seven innings.
“I hit them with all my pitches,” Hanewich said. “I was opening up too soon and sometimes the slider didn’t break. It was just spinning.”
Even after putting eight guys on base, Hanewich was able to keep them from scoring.
“You want to stop the running game and keep them from scoring,” Hanewich said. “Getting the ground ball is the best case scenario.”
The Cardinal (14-8, 4-2 Pac-12) travels to Berkeley to take on California (18-6) in a nonconference game on Tuesday night before setting off for a three-game set with host UCLA (12-13, 4-5) beginning Thursday. Stanford plays eight of its next nine games on the road.
The Golden Bears are currently in a tie, with Utah, for first place in the Pac-12. They edged the Bruins, 5-4, on Sunday.
“Every game is important but they are our rivals,” Hanewich said. “It’s a game we want to win.”