Cal vs. Arizona Sunday baseball recap: Bears complete sweep of Wildcats with 8-3 win

What a disaster

The Arizona Wildcats entered the weekend essentially needing to win two-of-three in each series from here on out to have any chance of returning to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since the 2012 National Championship.

They won zero games.

Cal completed the sweep on Sunday afternoon in front of a lifeless crowd, beating the lifeless Wildcats by a score of 8-3.

Arizona took its first lead of the series in the bottom of the fourth. After Jared Oliva walked and stole second base, JJ Matijevic mashed a ball into left-center field to bring home the run and put the Wildcats up 1-0.

Matijevic was stranded there though after Zach Gibbons and Cody Ramer each made outs to end the inning.

That lead was short-lived as Cal responded right back in the top of the fifth. Bobby Dalbec had not allowed a hit to that point, but with one out, Mitchell Kranson hit a single to left. A double, a Kevin Newman error, and a single put Cal in front 2-1.

That wasn't all though as the Bears would tack on two more runs on a sac bunt and an Aaron Knapp single to right.

Then just one hitter into the sixth inning, Dalbec would come out after a visit from the trainer.

Cal added two more runs in the seventh off of Robby Medel. The combo of Cameron Ming and Tyger Talley gave up two more of their own in the 8th.

Arizona did have a major scoring chance in its half of the seventh. Justin Behnke led the inning off with a double down the left field line. After a wild pitch moved him to third, Scott Kingery drove him in with a single to right center.

Kevin Newman then flied out to the third baseman, and Dalbec walked. After a Cal pitching change, Riley Moore singled to load the bases with just one out.

Oliva struck out, and Matijevic grounded out to second because Arizona is the worst at hitting with the bases loaded.

The third Arizona run came in the ninth, when Riley Moore hit a one-out single to right to drive in Kingery.

Arizona, now 24-17 overall, and 9-12 in conference play, has pretty much seen any postseason aspirations evaporate with this horrible three-game performance. And they'll have to take on ASU Tuesday night at 6 PM before heading to Washington next weekend.

Just when you thought 2014 was a distant memory, all of the sudden this team is doing things more poorly than that team. What a mess.

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