HILO, Hawai`i—The Hawai`i Hilo baseball team went toe-to-toe for  the first few rounds with the Pacific West Conference's version of a heavyweight champ in Dixie State on Tuesday night at Wong Stadium.

Unfortunately, the hard-hitting Trailblazers found a knockout punch in each game during 17-4 and 9-5 wins for the visitors, who lead the conference in hitting and are tied for first place with Azusa Pacific. The two wins and hitting show kept them ahead in both categories, improving to 33-10-1 on the season and to 22-7-1 in the PacWest. The Vulcans are now 8-25 overalll and 8-23 in conference play.

In both games, the Vulcans were tied or had early leads through the first half of the game, only to see things come undone in the sixth inning.

In the opener, UHH senior starting pitcher Eric Vega held the Trailblazers to just one hit and no runs through the first two innings. In the third inning, Dixie State, who came into the game hitting .347 as a team, put together their first rally with three runs on three hits to make it 3-0.

But the Vulcans answered back with three runs of their own in the bottom half of the inning. Luke Van-Artsen singled and was moved to second on a sacrifice bunt. Jonathan Segovia followed with an RBI-single to get the home team on the board. Phillip Steering walked and Jacob Grijalva then drilled a two-run double to tie the game at 3-3.

It stayed that way until the top of sixth, when the Trailblazers finally found their grove. They would chase Vega with four runs and three hits in that inning, and then would score a total of 11 runs in the next four innings on 11 hits.

DSU would finish with 21 hits in the game, four of them by Drew McLaughlin. Trey Kamachi had three hits and a home run, while Jake Davison had a home run and five RBI.

Van-Artsen was the only Vulcan player with two hits, while doubles were in the boxscore for Steering, Grijalva and Segovia.

In the nightcap, UH Hilo jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first inning when Segovia and Steering singled and then sprinted home on a triple by Cole Nagamine. Grijalva's ground ball brought home another run to give the Vulcans a 3-0 margin.

That's where it stayed with Drew Ichikawa on the mound until the Trailblazers got a run across in the third inning, and then tied it in the fourth with a pair of runs on three hits. After the visitors scored in the top of the fifth, it was still a one-run game, and the Vuls then tied it in the bottom of the inning on singles by Segovia, Nagamine and Austin Forney to make it 4-4.

Then came the dreaded sixth stanza again. With no one on and two outs, Dixie State caught fire with three hits and three runs, sending Ichikawa from the game. The Vulcans got an unearned run back in the sixth, but Dixie added two more runs in the seventh and then kept UHH off the board the rest of the way.

The Vulcans had 13 hits in the game (Dixie State had 12), but they left nine runners on base. Segovia and Nagamine had three hits apiece, while Van-Artsen and Forney had two base knocks in the contest.

The Vulcans and Trailblazers will wrap up the four-game series with a pair of games on Wednesday, start time is noon. Eight UH Hilo seniors will be honored after the second game of the doubleheader.