UC Irvine Knocks Out ASU Baseball In Los Angeles Regional

By Alex Swift

After making the NCAA tournament for the first time in the Willie Bloomquist era, the Arizona State baseball season is over.

A pair of four-run innings from No. 2 seed UC Irvine powered the Anteaters over the No. 3 Sun Devils 11-6 Sunday, ASU’s second loss of the Los Angeles Regional.
The 2025 ASU baseball season was one to remember, despite how it ended, ASU coach Willie Bloomquist said.

“End of the day, I’m extremely proud of our guys for the effort and everything they gave to this program,” he said. “I think this was one of those teams you’re going to remember for a long time for just how much they cared about each other and how much they played for each other.”

On Sunday, with clouds clearing over Jackie Robinson Stadium, ASU would face UCI in an elimination game. The winner earned the right to face UCLA later in the day, while the loser would have to take the trip back home. Ryder Brooks took the mound for UCI while Derek Schaefer, who was on Tennessee’s 2024 College World Series winning team, started for the Sun Devils.

UC Irvine’s home run power would drive it to a victory in the elimination game. Five home runs, two of which were solo shots, chipped away at the ASU pitching staff to earn the victory.

“There’s a little more swing and miss and strikeouts than we would like, but we got a lot of guys who can change the game with one swing,” said UC Irvine coach Ben Orloff, who won his second Big West championship as a coach this season. “What we might be lacking in some other areas, we can change the game with one swing and we saw that today.”

After both teams traded runs in the first inning, a one-run third from UC Irvine set up the Anteaters’ bats for a big fourth. With no outs, designated hitter Alonso Reyes hit a ball over the right field wall to extend Irvine’s lead to three before right fielder Chase Call hit a two-run home run with two outs.

Isaiah Jackson answered with a home run in the bottom of the fourth, but ASU struggled to build momentum until the sixth, where two doubles from designated hitter Brandon Compton and third baseman Beckett Zavorek drove in three runs to cut UC Irvine’s lead to two.

In the next half inning, the Anteaters had an answer. A home run, throwing error and an RBI double gave UC Irvine its second four-run inning of the game.

Shortstop Matt King drove in Zavorek in the eighth inning to cut the lead to five, but ASU would not get a hit for the rest of the game.

The Sun Devils left Los Angeles with positive feelings about their season.

A 6-1 start powered ASU to its final record of 35-22, its best since 2021. Five-game winning streaks in March and April were the longest the Sun Devils posted all season, not picking up their longest losing streak until the end of the regular season, when they lost four in a row.

Making the NCAA tournament after four years, ASU’s regional performance mirrored their results in 2021. Winning game one before dropping the next two was the same outcome ASU faced in the Austin regional in 2021.

Bloomquist made his first NCAA tournament as a head coach, slowly improving every year of his tenure. After 2022 saw the Sun Devils post a 26-32 record, Bloomquist led his team to 32-win seasons in 2023 and 2024 before picking up 35 regular season victories in 2025.

Both sides of the ball powered ASU to its 35-win season. A .318 team batting average ranked ninth in the country, which added onto its 645 strikeouts, good enough for fourth.

ASU found success in individual performances as well. Senior shortstop Matt King’s .405 batting average was 12th nationally, while junior pitcher Ben Jacob’s 114 strikeouts were good for ninth.

King transferred to ASU before 2025 and embraced the experience.

“It’s truly an honor to be mentioned with the names that have come through this program,” said King, who spent the 2024 season at Texas San Antonio. “I’m just thankful and grateful just to be here and that everything went well.”

ASU baseball recently announced it will increase the number of scholarships it can offer from 11.7 to 34 next season. After his first NCAA tournament appearance, Bloomquist is confident he can continue to grow his program.

“There’s no better place to play baseball than Tempe, Arizona,” Bloomquist said. “Especially with the momentum that we have and the fan support, the resources that we’re getting thrown into the program. All that stuff is things that, in my mind, make this future extremely bright at our program.”

The season ended at the Los Angeles Regional for ASU, but the journey did not go unseen by Bloomquist.

“This team that we have was very resilient,” Bloomquist said. “We went through our ups and downs throughout the year. We had our adversities and these kids kept on grinding and didn’t waver. They played hard regardless of the score, regardless of being up or down runs. These guys played hard.”