Other than in off-season practice, Damian Bravo had never played center field for the Texas Tech baseball team until about 10 days ago. He's handling the transition with no apparent problems.

Bravo laid out in the gap to catch a Trevor Haskins liner, ending the second inning in the Red Raiders' home series opener Tuesday night against Stanford. Bravo's cap flew off, and he popped up to show he'd caught the ball.

It was one of two sparkling catches Tech outfielders made in the game, the other coming from left fielder Drew Woodcox, who saved a run.

Bravo, a sophomore from Haltom started Texas Tech's first 19 games of the season in left field. He moved to center for the March 22 series opener against Brigham Young and has started the past seven games there.

Bravo's switch partially helped open up more playing time for a logjam of corner outfielders and give the lineup more thump. Bravo went into Monday tied for the NCAA Division I lead in doubles with 16. He also was leading the Big 12 in batting average (.426) and ranked fourth or fifth in the conference in hits (43), runs (33) and on-base plus slugging percentage (1.136).

Woodcox's catch stranded a runner at third base in the fifth inning. Cardinal third baseman Temo Becerra hit a fly to shallow left-center off reliever Trendan Parish, and Woodcox dashed in, sprawled and snagged the ball just in time. Woodcox's cap also came off as he hit the turf and rolled over, and Bravo was there to scoop it up for him.

Texas Tech was 19-9 and Stanford 11-13 going into Monday's game. The teams complete the series at noon Tuesday at Dan Law Field/Rip Griffin Park.

Around the conference: UCF baseball is on the rise | Big 12 baseball power rankings

Previous series recap: Mac Heuer recaptures form in win at UCF | Texas Tech baseball takeaways

This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: See sparkling catches by Texas Tech baseball's Damian Bravo, Drew Woodcox