SPOKANE, Wash.—Senior left hander Christian Cecilio battled through a couple of jams, settled down, and shut down the Gonzaga lineup as he went the distance for 2-0 Dons win on Saturday night and evened the series at a game apiece.
 
Cecilio (1-1) threw his first complete game of the season and scattered seven hits with nine strikeouts.
 
"The night belonged to Christian," San Francisco head coach Nino Giarratano said. "He had command of his fastball. He executed pitches… it was a good thing."
 
The Dons will go for the series win on Sunday at 12 p.m. with Jeider Rincon (1-2) on the mound.
 
"[Friday] was uncharacteristic of how we have played," Giarratano said of the team's 7-0 loss on Friday night. "[Tonight] showed our toughness and character. Hopefully we are ready to play like we're capable of tomorrow."
 
Gonzaga put the pressure on the Dons in the first and got a leadoff single. A wild pitch and a groundout moved the runner to third with two down but Cecilio was able to get a groundout to Nico Giarratano at short to end the inning.
 
The Bulldogs put another rally together in the third and had two singles to set up runners at first and second with two down but a line out to Derek Atkinson in centerfield ended the threat.
 
Much like Cecilio, Gonzaga starter Andrew Sopko kept the USF bats quiet for the first few innings but the Dons finally made some noise in the fourth.
 
Connor Hofmann led off the inning with an infield single and moved up to second on a sacrifice bunt. Two batters later, Brendan Hendriks came up and sent a double down the leftfield line to score Hofmann and give the Dons a 1-0 lead.
 
It was one of two doubles on the day for Hendriks as he went 2-for-4 on the day.
 
Cecilio settled down at that point and faced only two batters over the minimum between the third and seventh innings.
 
"It was good to see both Christian and Hendi step up," Giarratano said. "That's the kind of stuff you need to get back to .500. Hopefully, we can win the series tomorrow and put ourselves in a good spot."
 
San Francisco had a chance to add on in the fifth when Manny Ramirez, Jr. led off with a double to right center but two batters later was caught too far off third on a groundball back to the pitcher and was thrown out.
 
Hendriks doubled to lead off the seventh and, two batters later, Ramirez brought him in on a single to center to give USF the two-run cushion.
 
Gonzaga had one last chance to get back into the game when, in the eighth, the Bulldogs put two on with two outs but Cecilio got the strikeout get out of the jam.
 
The performance also allowed the Dons bullpen to get some rest after throwing 8.2 innings over the last four days.
 
"We played both Tuesday and Wednesday, played yesterday… giving the bullpen a rest allows us to matchup when we need to," Giarratano said.
 
NOTES
Christian Cecilio made his 47th career start as a Don, which ties him with Kevin Rose for second on the USF all-time list.