IRVINE, Calif.—Late inning BYU baseball rallies came too late in a 9-2 loss Saturday afternoon at UC Irvine.

BYU, now 5-6, found its stride returning from the previous night’s 6-1 victory over the Anteaters (8-6).

Five of BYU’s seven hits Saturday did not come until after pitcher Crosby Slaught left the game in the seventh inning.  Slaught pitched a no-hitter through the first three innings until BYU’s Jaycob Brugman singled in the fourth.

“We hit a lot of balls hard, but our production wasn’t very good,” said BYU coach Vance Law.

A fifth-inning solo home run by freshman Taylor Sparks was the first dinger surrendered this season by BYU and the first of the season by an Anteater, extending their lead to 8-0.

Then in the seventh inning, Alex Wolfe led off with a hard double which chased Slaught off the mound and enabled the senior co-captain to score BYU’s first run.  That made the score 8-1.

Prior to that breakthrough, Brugman added a ray of light when he recorded his first outfield assist of the year.  The BYU right fielder threw out Christian Ramirez at second base.  In the sixth inning, Brugman narrowly missed pulling off an inning-ending double play when an Anteater lined out to him and the sophomore nearly threw out Connor Spencer trotting back to first base.

The Cougar hustle continued in the sixth when first baseman Brock Whitney stretched to field the bullet fired by shortstop Tanner Chauncey to strand Spencer at third and end the inning.

The Cougars’ second run of the game came in the ninth when with bases loaded, and Whitney scoring after extending his hitting streak to a team-leading four games.

“It all boils down to pitching,” said Law.  “You can’t defend walks or hit batters.  Contrast that with their pitcher (Slaught) was throwing strikes and only walked one batter.”

Sophomore lefty Daniel Welch was one of four BYU relievers on the day, giving up no runs in two innings to remain one of five Cougars with 0.00 earned run averages.

BYU flies to Nebraska where it plays Nebraska-Omaha on Monday afternoon, followed by a Tuesday afternoon game at Creighton.

Both BYU and host UC Irvine look to bounce back from a pair of baseball losses last week as they start a three-game series Thursday.

The Anteaters (6-5) have been ranked No. 21, 24 and 30 in previous weeks, but are out of the polls this week due to a pair of losses at Baylor.  Meanwhile, BYU (4-4) has hopes for a better showing after a pair of losses at No. 4 Arkansas.

“We’re excited to get back at it again,” said BYU coach Vance Law after a rare weekend off from games.  “This will be a good challenge against a good club.  Hopefully we learned a few things at Arkansas.”

The starting BYU pitching remains the same as those who produced a 4-2 record going into the Arkansas series.  Chris Capper (0-2, 4.91), Mark Anderson (2-0, 2.13) and Adam Miller (1-0, 0.00) will start on the mound for games Thursday, Friday and Saturday, respectively.

Miller is among five pitchers on the BYU staff with a 0.00 ERA thus far, including freshman Mason Marshall who has two saves in 7.1 innings.

In the first NCAA statistics of this season, BYU was 59th in fielding and 63rd in triples. Austin Hall was 13th in triples and Miller was tied with many at No. 1 in ERA at 0.00.

The games at 6:30, 6:30 and 1 p.m. PST, will be broadcast live on the Internet through links on www.byucougars.com and may be broadcast live locally in California on KUCI FM (88.9) depending on the outcome of UC Irvine basketball games in the Big West Tournament.

BYU leads the series, 7-6, against UC Irvine, having split the last time they played in 2005.  The Anteaters won the first meeting in 1970.