KINGSVILLE, Texas – The Texas A&M University-Kingsville baseball program closed the non-conference portion of the regular-season schedule on a high note with an 11-1 win over the University of Houston-Victoria on Friday at Nolan Ryan Field in a midweek matchup.

The Javelinas (25-8) jumped out to an early lead and never looked back en route to the season sweep against the Jaguars (11-24).

Sophomore Dax McCleary (Sweeny, Texas) opened up the scoring in the bottom of the first as he scored on a wild pitch from UHV's Alec Cruz, while sophomore David De La Cruz, Jr. (Alice, Texas) roped an RBI double to left center to bring junior Donovan Lewis (Alvin, Texas) home to start the scoring in the second.

De La Cruz ended up crossing the plate later in the frame after swiping third and scoring on an errant throw from Chase Almendarez following the attempt to throw him out.

Freshman Giancarlo Servin (Edinburg, Texas) tacked on another with a bases-loaded free pass to cap sophomore Hayden Fails (Sweeny, Texas) for a 4-0 lead heading into the third.

Senior Jarred Taylor (Vidor, Texas) got the start on the mound for TAMUK and turned in three innings of work with three punchouts to go with his second win of the year. Taylor worked out of the third inning with a pair of ground balls and a fly out to left to end his outing.

Houston-Victoria was stymied all day by the Blue and Gold hurlers as the visitors were held to three hits in the game after getting one each from Nolan Maciejeski, Chase Tamez and Almendarez.

Junior Garrett Alexander (Spring, Texas) took over pitching duties once Taylor got the hook and turned in two near-flawless innings of work with four strikeouts and one walk. Sophomore Tyler Crouch (Bulverde, Texas) took over in the sixth and surrendered the lone run to the Jaguars, which was unearned, while redshirt-senior Trey Taylor (Leander, Texas) and senior Seth Hubert (Riviera, Texas) teamed up to close the seventh.

Meanwhile, the Hogs pushed five runs across in the fourth after Servin started the rally with a bounding-ball double through the left side, scoring Fails, while sophomore Brad Jones (Crandall, Texas) added an run-scoring infield single to short that capped Servin before senior Travis Geiser (Portland, Texas) dropped a ball into center field to plate Jones.

Redshirt-junior Tim Gleinser (Victoria, Texas) brought Geiser home on a diving liner into right while De La Cruz brought the final run of the inning home on an infield single to short that allowed Gleinser to score.

Jones provided the final say in the game for the hosts as he laced a two-run single to right to score McCleary and Fails that set the line score at 11-0 heading into the sixth.

UHV got its lone run in the sixth after a Javelina miscue that was the end result of a rundown between second and third.

Crouch had Tamez dead-to-rights at second base after a pickoff attempt that was fielded by redshirt-junior Alex Gonzalez (Corpus Christi, Texas), but Maciejeski broke for home once Tamez reached third and an errant throw over the head of redshirt-sophomore Ryan Rodriguez (Corpus Christi, Texas) allowed the Jaguar to score.

Crouch induced a popup to first to end the inning before T. Taylor and Hubert closed out the seventh.

The Hogs will head out on the road over the weekend to take on Eastern New Mexico in a four-game Lone Star series. The series has been pushed back to two doubleheaders on Saturday and Sunday due to inclement weather forecasted in the Portales, N.M., area.

Game one of Saturday's doubleheader is scheduled for a 2 p.m. CT first pitch, while Sunday's doubleheader is set for the same, with both days being played in seven innings for game one and nine innings for game two.

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