Season-Opening Weekend Sends Utes to San Francisco

Friday, February 17

San Francisco, CA

2:00 PM

University of Utah

San Francisco

Photo by: Rob Gray

Season-Opening Weekend Sends Utes to San Francisco

2/15/2023 11:00 AM | Baseball

Gary Henderson's club outbound to the Bay Area for four-game series with the Dons

2023 Utah Baseball Game Notes
Games 1-4 Date // Time (MT)	Utah (0-0 overall, 0-0 Pac-12) at San Francisco (0-0 overall, 0-0 West Coast) Friday, Feb. 17 // 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 18 // 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 19 // 2 p.m. Monday, Feb. 20 // 2 p.m.
Location	San Francisco, Calif. (Benedetti Diamond)
Live Statistics	StatBroadcast Click here
Stream	WCC Network Friday // Saturday // Sunday // Monday
Game Notes	Utah // Pac-12 Conference
@UtahBaseball Social Media	Twitter // Instagram // Facebook // #GoUtes // #UteNotes

The First Pitch: Things to Know

The 2023 season has arrived for the Utah baseball team and Chapter One of the campaign sends Gary Henderson's ballclub to San Francisco for a four-game series from Friday through Monday, February 17-20. All four games are set for a 2 p.m. MT first pitch at Benedetti Diamond.
It's been a while since these teams have met—not since February 1999 have the Utes and Dons squared off on the diamond. Tim Esmay's Utah squad came away with the win in the middle game of that series, a 13-12 slugfest that saw the Utes go off for 14 hits.
Utah was 4-1-1 against the West Coast Conference last season. The Utes won the first two games of the 2022 season at Loyola Marymount's Page Stadium before playing to a 10-inning tie in the series finale. Later, Utah went on to take two of three midweek matchups from in-state rival BYU, highlighted by an 8-7 walk-off triumph on April 19 in Salt Lake City. BYU announced it will depart the WCC for the Big 12 Conference following this season.
Although the Utes fell short of reaching the 2022 Pac-12 Tournament, the relatively young club showed signs of promise for the future. Utah (26) had a nine-win improvement from the previous season, set Pac-12 era program records in seven offensive categories and had the program's first-ever ABCA/Rawlings Gold Glove winner in first baseman Alex Baeza.
Returning catcher/infielder Davis Cop, plus infielder Landon Frei, were named to the Pac-12 All-Conference Honorable Mention team last season. Baeza was additionally named to the Pac-12 All-Defensive Team.

Davis Cop Named Pac-12 Preseason All-Conference

Catcher and infielder Davis Cop was announced as part of the Pac-12 Preseason All-Conference Team on February 8.
Injuries in front of Cop last season necessitated Cop taking over the starting catcher role in March after having played in just one game to that point. He finished the year with 35 starts behind the dish—including catching Matthew Sox's complete game win at USC on April 22. The Valencia, California, product tallied a .354 batting average with seven doubles, three home runs and 26 RBI.
He was especially clutch during the Pac-12 Conference slate, batting a team-best .367. He ranked third on the team in slugging percentage (.478) in Pac-12 games. All told, Cop logged 14 multi-hit games on the season and had a season-long hitting streak of eight games.

D1Baseball.com Lauds Utes
Every preseason, D1Baseball.com compiles a list of the top MLB Draft prospects and impact freshmen in each conference.

The Utes have three student-athletes in the top-30 of the site's Pac-12 list for the 2023 draft, including right-handed pitcher Cam Day (No. 18), outfielder Kai Roberts (No. 22) and right-handed pitcher Blake Whiting (No. 28).
Southpaw Micah Ashman (No. 21) and right-hander Jaden Harris (No. 24) made the cut for the 2024 draft.
Two Utes were named among D1Baseball's Pac-12 Impact Freshmen in third baseman/catcher Cameron Gurney (No. 16) and outfielder Kaden Carpenter (No. 24).