Rain clouds parted long enough yesterday for Hawai'i to sweep a doubleheader from UC Santa Barbara, 8-6 and 3-0, at Les Murakami Stadium.

A Kuhio Day crowd of 808 watched the Rainbows (22-8) clinch their seventh series of the season. The twin bill was necessary because Sunday's opener with the Gauchos (9-12) was rained out.

Justin Costi and Darrell Fisherbaugh combined on a one-hitter in the scheduled seven-inning second game.

Matt Daly and Steven Wright combined for 5 2/3 scoreless relief innings for starter Ian Harrington in the opener.

Derek DuPree was the clutch hitter in both games. His two-out, RBI single in the sixth broke a 6-all game in the opener and his run-scoring triple ignited a three-run fifth in the second game. He was 3 for 6 with two RBIs in the two games. He also had a diving catch in the first game to rob Patrick Rose of a hit.

"That's what he's been doing for us," UH coach Mike Trapasso said. "He plays great defense, gets timely hits. He's come up big for us."

In the opener, Harrington gave up two unearned runs in the first inning and was in control through the third inning. Meanwhile, his team got him three runs each in the first and second innings to give him a 6-2 lead. But the Gauchos sent nine batters to the plate in the fourth to score four to tie the game at 6. After Chris Valaika's RBI double tied the game, Harrington hit Robbie Blauer with a pitch. That's when Trapasso brought in Daly (4-0), who got the third out. In 3 1/3 innings, he allowed two hits and a walk and struck out three.

He settled the game to give UH enough time to take the lead in the sixth. With two outs, Robbie Wilder walked, stole second and scored on DuPree's single to center.

The Rainbows got an insurance run in the eighth. Joe Spiers tripled to left-center off left-hander Andrew Schonenberger, who then struck out Wilder. After UH pinch-hit the left-handed DuPree for the right-handed Jorge Franco, UCSB countered by bringing in right-handed submariner Justin Segal, whose wild pitch scored Spiers.

Wright pitched the final two innings, striking out one, to notch his first save since last season. Wright, who was supposed to start Sunday, is scheduled to pitch Friday's WAC series opener against San Jose State.

"We brought him in Fish's situation, but Steve's gotta stay sharp for Friday and he had to throw two innings today," Trapasso said. "If we didn't get him his work, he'd go into Friday too strong and you never know what can happen."

Wright had four saves last season and won a relief pitcher award during the summer in the Cape Cod League.

"It was fun getting in there, doing what I did over the summer," Wright said.

Justin Frash was 4 for 5 in the doubleheader with three RBIs in the opener.

In the nightcap, it was all Costi, who engaged in a duel with UCSB's Brian Tracy, son of former Los Angeles Dodgers manager Jim Tracy. Costi (4-0) allowed a third-inning lead-off single to Brian Gump and had a career-high 10 strikeouts. He gave up three walks, two of them in a row, after getting his 10th strikeout in the top of the seventh.

"I was just trying to be too fine with my fastball on the corners and ended up walking those last two guys," said Costi, who has won his past four starts.

That's when he was pulled for Fisherbaugh, who got the next two batters for his fifth save.

"I don't think you'll see Justin more on top of his game," Trapasso said. "He had all three pitches going."

Costi is owner of UH's two shutouts. The other was a 3-0 complete-game win against Western Illinois in a game called after 4 1/2 innings because of rain.

The Rainbows broke the scoreless deadlock against Tracy (1-4), who went 5 1/3 innings, in the fifth on DuPree's triple and Luis Avila's two-run double.

The series concludes at 6:35 tonight.

Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at skaneshiro@honoluluadvertiser.com.