WOLF PACK BASEBALL NOTEBOOK: Gardner enjoying dream season

RENO - Matt Gardner is enjoying a season that pitchers normally can only dream about.

"So far so good," smiled the Nevada Wolf Pack relief pitcher after Saturday's 8-3 victory over the New Mexico State Aggies at Peccole Park. "I've been lucky. And my defense has been incredible behind me."

Luck and defense, as well as a talented right arm and confident presence on the mound, have carried Gardner through 13 near-perfect appearances this season.

The 2007 Damonte Ranch High graduate has not allowed an earned run all season over 13.2 innings. He pitched yet another scoreless inning on Saturday, wrapping up the Pack's four-game series sweep over the Aggies.

"He's fearless," Pack coach Gary Powers said. "He goes out there and challenges hitters and competes on every pitch."

That's all Powers expects out of any of his pitchers. And it's all Gardner has done this entire season.

"I just keep going out and doing what I do," Gardner said. "It's working so far."

It has been nearly two months since Gardner has allowed a run. He allowed four on Feb. 27 at Loyola Marymount but all four were unearned, keeping him atop the Wolf Pack's ERA charts at 0.00.

Gardner, who pitched for the Community College of Southern Nevada in 2008 and 2009 before missing the entire 2010 season at Nevada with Tommy John surgery, is 2-0 with four saves and has allowed just six hits with 18 strikeouts and six walks.

"I had no idea what to expect this season," Gardner said. "Coming back from Tommy John surgery, you never know. I had to start from stage one with my mechanics all over again. My first couple of throws after the surgery were only about 30 feet but they felt like nine miles.

"But I feel good now. They say it takes a full 24 months to get back to where you were before the surgery and I'm at about 16 months now. But I'm getting there."

Powers said he always had confidence that Gardner could fill the closer role.

"He certainly had the attitude for it," Powers said. "Of all the guys we have he's best suited for it. I knew he could handle it mentally and that's a big part of it. Matt worked his tail off last year getting back so that he would be ready to play this year. Of all the guys we had, he worked the hardest of all of them."

The 6-foot, 190-pound Gardner, though, admits the 2010 season wasn't easy.

"It was real tough mentally," he said. "Sitting in the stands and charting pitches is not for me. I want to play everyday. So it was tough.

"I know that the success rate with this surgery is pretty high. So all you have to do is just let the process play itself out, work hard and you'll be back. But in the back of your mind, you still worry. You don't know for sure what to expect until you get back out there and do it."

Gardner has thrived in the closer's role.

"I love it," he said. "Ask anybody. I don't have the mental capacity to be a starter. I'm a one-inning guy. I want to go out there and give it all I got on every pitch. Closing is what I want to do."

STASSI BUILDING ENDURANCE: Pitch by pitch, inning by inning, Brock Stassi is getting back to where he was a year ago.

"The shoulder feels great," said Stassi, who didn't make his first appearance on the mound this season because of a sore shoulder until March 26 in Seattle against Washington. "I'm feeling stronger each time out there."

Stassi battled through his longest outing of the season on Saturday when he went five innings and tossed 92 pitches to pick up his first victory since last May. The left-hander is now 1-1 this year in four starts with a 6.59 ERA.

"He just needs to get stronger," Powers said. "He's getting his legs stronger and his arm is coming around."

Stassi was the WAC's Pitcher of the Year in 2010 when he went 7-4 with a 3.43 ERA as a junior.

"He's still a ways away from where he was last year," Powers said. "He's probably 75% of that right now. But he's getting there."

Stassi was limited to 50 and 46 pitches in his first two outings against Washington and Utah Valley (April 2). He threw 75 pitches against Seattle on April 10 and made a big jump to 92 on Saturday.

"It's just a matter of going out there and getting my feet wet on the mound again," he said.

Stassi isn't experiencing any problems with a bat in his hand lately. The left-handed hitter leads the Pack with a .350 average and .483 on base percentage. He has 21 hits in his last 42 at bats over his last 11 games.

"I'm just seeing the ball well and putting a good swing on it," he said.

After the first 12 games of the year he was hitting .211.

"I wasn't really frustrated about my hitting," he said. "At that time I was more frustrated about the fact that we weren't winning. I'm the type of guy who tries to be the same when I go 0-for-30 or whether I'm in a hot streak. I don't want to get too high or too low."

SHIPLEY EARNING PLAYING TIME: It seems that freshman Braden Shipley has settled in as the Pack's starting shortstop.

The 6-foot-2, 170-pound freshman drove in two runs on Saturday and now has gone 8-for-20 (.400) over his last seven games against Fresno State and New Mexico State.

It wasn't all that long ago that Shipley was in jeopardy of falling off the Pack's depth chart after going 3-for-26 from March 26 through April 12.

Shipley, though, hit his first home run on Friday and has raised his average 47 points over the last seven games to .247.

SEASON WINDING DOWN: The Wolf Pack will next be in action for four games at Louisiana Tech starting on Friday.

The Pack will return to Peccole Park for its final homestand May 5-15 with four games against Hawaii (May 5-7) and four against Sacramento State (May 13-15) before closing out the regular season May 20-22 with four games at San Jose State.

CIRCLING THE BASES: The Wolf Pack is now 13-6 at Peccole Park this season. They have won seven in a row at home and 10 of their last 12 . . . The Wolf Pack is 2-14 away from home . . . Mark Joukoff pitched well in his first relief outing of the year on Saturday, hurling two shutout innings. Joukoff had made eight starts but struggled in his last three outings before being replaced in the starting rotation by Troy Marks . . . Marks has pitched well in his two starts against Fresno State and New Mexico State with a 3.68 ERA and 14 strikeouts (just one walk) over 14.2 innings . . . First baseman Hugo Hernandez went 4-for-9 in three games against New Mexico State after going 1-for-8 in three games last weekend at Fresno State . . . Nick Melino snapped an 0-for-29 slump with five hits and seven RBI this weekend against New Mexico State.