MALIBU, Calif. – Waves batters continued their hot streak to start the year on Tuesday afternoon, pounding out 15 hits en route to an 11-4 win over UC Riverside at Eddy D. Field Stadium.

With 11 runs on Tuesday, Pepperdine (3-1) has now scored 42 runs in its last three games, an average of 14 runs per game. The Highlanders (2-3) dropped their third consecutive game with the loss.

The Highlanders got on the board in the first inning, as three consecutive singles and a sacrifice fly added to an early 2-0 lead. The Waves responded in the second inning as a Ryan Heroy (Henderson, Nev./Green Valley HS) RBI double plated Eric Thames (San Jose, Calif./West Valley JC/Bellarmine Prep), and a Matt Aidem (Valencia, Calif./UC Santa Barbara/Valencia HS) RBI groundout scored Trent Diedrich (Fresno, Calif./Bullard HS), knotting the score at 2-2. Pepperdine added another run in the third inning on Chase d’Arnaud’s (Long Beach, Calif./Los Alamitos HS) second home run of the season, a line drive blast over the left-center field fence, but the Highlanders tied the score again the top of the fourth with a home run off the bat of Ryan Goetz. The Waves then reclaimed the lead in the fifth inning, as a Donald Brown (Camarillo, Calif./Camarillo HS) sacrifice fly, a Thames run-scoring single and an RBI double from Diedrich pushed the margin to 6-3. Freshman Matt Bywater (Thousand Oaks, Calif./Thousand Oaks HS) limited UC Riverside to just three runs through the first 5.2 innings before giving way to Jordan Durrance (Manteca, Calif./Sierra HS), who induced a fly ball with two runners on base in the sixth to keep the score at 6-3. The Highlanders again attempted to rally in the seventh, as they loaded the bases with one out, but senior Nick Gaudi (Lancaster, Calif./Paraclete HS) relieved Durrance with the bases loaded and allowed just one run to score to keep the Waves in front, 6-4. The Waves responded with three runs in their half of the seventh, as the first five batters reached base, pushing the margin to 9-4. They tacked on two more runs in the eighth to increase the lead to 11-4, and Gaudi pitched the last 2.2 scoreless innings to register the save.

“It was great to see Matt Bywater perform as well as he did today,” Pepperdine Coach Steve Rodriguez said. “He threw his changeup for strikes and he kept them off balance. Offensively, we were able to steal some bases and we continued to swing the bats well.”

The Waves offense was paced by d’Arnaud, who was 2-for-4 with three runs scored and two RBI, Thames, who notched three hits and three runs scored, and Diedrich, who was 3-for-5 with two runs scored and two RBI. Additionally, Bryce Mendonca (San Leandro, Calif./Chabot JC) recorded his fourth consecutive multi-hit game to start the year with a 2-for-5 effort. Bywater earned his first collegiate victory by allowing just four hits and three runs in 5.2 innings of work, while Gaudi notched his second save of the season.

Drew Garcia was 2-for-4 for the Highlanders, and Eddie Orozco incurred the loss for UCR.

Up next, the Waves will compete in the Minnesota Dairy Queen Classic in Minneapolis, Minn. from Friday, Feb. 29 through Sunday, Mar 2. at the Hubert H Humphrey Metrodome, home of MLB’s Minnesota Twins and the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings. The Waves will face Tulane at 12:15 p.m. CT on Friday, TCU at 12:15 p.m. on Saturday and Minnesota on Sunday at 3 p.m.