Barton's Five Hits Leads Hurricanes Past Illinois-Chicago, 6-3
March 19, 2004
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Brian Barton collected a career-high five hits as the sixth-ranked Miami Hurricanes dispatched Illinois-Chicago, 6-3, in front of 1,099 fans at Mark Light Field Friday afternoon.
“We played a solid game today and beat a pretty good club in Illinois-Chicago,” Head Coach Jim Morris said. “Dan Touchet pitched an excellent game and we played good defensively. The bullpen came in and did its job to close out the game.”
Miami improves to 17-3 on the season while the Flames fall to 7-5.
Barton, a junior, collected two doubles and three singles on the day while driving in two runs. Paco Figueroa cracked his third home run of the season in the eighth to give Miami the final three-run cushion.
Touchet pitched 5.2 innings to improve his record to 4-0 on the season. He allowed only two runs (one earned) on six hits while striking out five. The Miami bullpen pitched 3.1 innings and allowed only one earned run on two hits to clean up for the Hurricanes.
George Huguet came on to pitch the ninth inning and earn his fourth save of the season. The save was the 35th of Huguet’s career and moved him into sole possession of second place on UM’s all-time saves list. Huguet is now two saves short of Rick Raether’s (1984-86) mark of 37.
UIC jumped out to an early 1-0 lead on a RBI double from right fielder Mike Hughes.
Miami countered in the bottom half of the first inning with a RBI double off the bat of Brian Barton, scoring Jon Jay who had singled with one out.
The Hurricanes took their first lead of the afternoon in the fifth inning on a RBI ground out from Erick San Pedro and a Flames’ error on shortstop Jordan DeVoir.
Miami tacked on two more runs in the sixth inning with a RBI single from Jim Burt and a RBI double from Barton.
Justin Johnson added a sacrifice fly to left field in the seventh inning for UIC’s third and final run of the game.
The Hurricanes and Flames return to the diamond Saturday, March 20, at 7 p.m. at Mark Light Field.
