UCLA righty Kelly Austin (Aaron Fitt)

Austin embodies ‘next man up’ mentality for injury-plagued UCLA

STANFORD, Calif. — Back on March 24, when UCLA was ranked in the top 10 and sitting pretty at 16-3 overall and 6-1 in the Pac-12, nobody would have envisioned that the Bruins would be fighting for their postseason lives by the end of April. But that’s exactly the position they found themselves in this weekend, with an RPI in the 40s and a conference record hovering around .500. UCLA took its fifth loss in its last seven games Friday night at Stanford, dropping the Bruins to 9-8-1 in the league, and making Saturday’s game feel critical.

But the Bruins[…]