(RV)/#15 Jags clinch RRAC-opening series with DH sweep of USW

The UHV baseball team sent the Valentine's Day crowd at Riverside Stadium home happy on Friday.

The Jaguars swept the University of the Southwest, 4-0 and 6-5, in a Red River Athletic Conference doubleheader.

It was the first two conference games of the season for UHV, which improves to 11-2 overall and 2-0 in the RRAC.

The Jaguars used two runs in the eighth after Southwest (7-6, 0-2) tied the game at 4-4 in the top of the inning. Juan Perez capped the scoring for UHV, laying down a perfectly executed suicide squeeze bunt to score Brady Thompson from third.

"We kind of laid back a few innings there," said head coach Jonathan Stavinoha. "We weren't playing our game. It was like, 'When are they (Southwest) gonna come?' They have a scrappy bunch. They were going to come back at some point in time and hats off to them for fighting back to tie the game."

Perez finished the doubleheader 3-for-7 with a double and two RBIs, all of which came in Game 2 of the doubleheader. He was one of eight different Jaguars to record a hit during the doubleheader. The Waller native is now on a two-game hitting streak.

Nobody provided a louder hit than Jose Montanez, who hit a towering, two-run home run to right field in the bottom of the sixth of Game 1 to put the Jaguars up 4-0 at the time. It was the first home run of the year for the Puerto Rican outfielder. He extended his hitting streak to five games with hits in each of the two games.

"We executed," Stavinoha said. "We did some things to put pressure on the other team and it came out in our favor. So, I'm really happy with how that turned out."

The Jaguars saw their starting pitchers continue to dominate.

Brady Parker took a no-hitter into the fifth inning of Game 1, which was scheduled for seven innings. The Victoria native tossed his second complete-game shutout of the year, allowing just two hits while striking out eight across seven innings of work for his third win of the season.

"I just went in ready to challenge everybody," Parker said, "to make them prove they can hit."

Senior Jonathan Jones followed Parker's lead, striking out eight while allowing just one hit over six shutout innings of work, but did not get the decision in the win.

Mason Longoria earned his third win of the season with two innings of relief. Jacob Baker earned his second save of the season.

"I couldn't say enough about the pitching today," Stavinoha said.

The series wraps up Saturday with 12 p.m. first pitch at Riverside Stadium.