WSU baseball (9-10) visits Santa Clara, Calif. for a 6 p.m. Wednesday game against the Santa Clara Broncos (11-7). 

The Cougs are 6-3 all-time against the Broncos. The last matchup came in February, 2019 and resulted in a 10-6 WSU victory. The Cougs have a 3-0 home record and a 3-3 away record all-time against Santa Clara.

The Cougs took the field last weekend in Seattle and got swept by the Washington Huskies in the first installment of the 2022 baseball Apple Cup. The Cougs scored a total of seven runs in three games and gave up 25 runs to the Huskies. WSU is in a bit of an early-season slump — they have won three of their last 10 games and currently are last in the Pac-12 with a 1-5 conference record. 

Santa Clara’s last outing was Sunday and resulted in a 9-0 loss at the hands of the San Francisco Dons. The Broncos have a game Tuesday against San Jose State before they host the Cougs. 

Santa Clara started their 2022 campaign by losing 2-3 to the USC Trojans — their lone win came in the last game of the series by a score of 9-7. The Broncos then were shutout 5-0 by the Stanford Cardinal. 

March has been a good month for the Broncos so far, sweeping UC San Diego and earning a single-game victory over Cal. On the season, the Broncos have scored 102 runs.

Offensively, the Broncos are led by Coleman Brigman who has 26 hits on 72 at-bats for a .361 batting average. He also leads the team in RBIs with 14 and is tied for the home run lead with two. His older brother Dawson Brigman has the second-most hits with 20 on 69 ABs, he also has 12 RBIs. 

Pitching for the Broncos is led by Cole Kitchen who has 44 strikeouts and has given up 24 hits in 26.2 innings pitched. Jared Feikes has also pitched 26.2 innings and has 21 strikeouts on 18 hits for an ERA of 2.36. Feikes is 4-0 on the season and Kitchen is 2-1. Nick Sando has 33 strikeouts and nine hits given up in just over 20 innings of work for a 2-0 record. Sando also has two saves to his name so far. 

Although the Cougs are in a slump, this game against the Broncos is crucial for WSU to regain their confidence offensively. WSU needs to have a clean defensive game to prepare them for their next conference matchup later in the week.

After the Cougs play Santa Clara, WSU will travel to Stanford, Calif. to continue their conference schedule for a three-game series against the Cardinal, with the first game starting Friday.