May 8, 2021

Mitchell one win from playoff bid

More news about: Elms | Mitchell
Senior infielder Steven Mirra recorded his 100th career hit on Saturday and collected his first career win on the mound as Mount Saint Mary College split a season ending doubleheader with Manhattaville, winning game one 6-5 in eight innings before falling in game two 7-3.
Mount Stain Mary's athletics photo

Top-seeded Mitchell College secured a spot in the title round of the 2021 New England Collegiate Conference Championship with an 8-3 victory over second-seeded New England College on Saturday afternoon. The Mariners (23-6 overall) scored five unanswered runs to advance through the winner's bracket. Hunter Yaworski went 3-for-4 with two doubles and four RBI to lead the Mitchell offense, and Anthony Diaz added a pair of hits that included an RBI single in the sixth that snapped a 3-3 tie. Starting pitcher Roland Thivierge went the distance on the bump, striking out eight while walking two. Mitchell will face either third-seeded Elms College on Sunday. Elms scored first in each of their elimination games winning 9-2 over Becker and advancing to the Championship game with a 4-3 win over New England College.

La Roche University swept Medaille College in the AMCC Quarterfinals Saturday afternoon in a best-of-three game series. The Redhawks took game one 9-0 and game two 8-1. LRU will host either Alfred State or Penn St. Altoona whos games were postponed until Sunday. Mount Aloyius also spet their series with 9-7 and 3-2 wins over Pitt-Greensburg. Like the La Roche Red Hawks, will have to wait to see who they will play next week. Pitt Bradford and Penn State-Behrens split their two games on Saturday.

After eleven innings of a tightly contested game two, Zach DeMattio was able to give Wheaton the win, 2-1, on a deep fly ball with the bases loaded. The Lyons also edged out Coast Guard Academy in game one, winning by a score of 3-1. Wheaton moves to 14-2 on the year and will play Babson in the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference Final next weekend. Babson also swepth their opponent on Saturday. The Beavers won 4-2 and 11-8 over Springfield.

Victor Cruz hit a three-run home run and Donald Zellman earned the win on the mound as top-seeded Rowan defeated eighth-seeded Stockton, 6-1, in the deciding game of the NJAC Championship Tournament Quarterfinal series. The Profs (22-4) now advance to the semifinals and will host a best-of-3 series beginning on Friday, May 14 at Sandcastle Stadium in Atlantic City, facing the winner of the Montclair State-Kean series that finishes up on Sunday. William Paterson will have to wait another day to see who they will face this weekend. Ramapo and TCNJ split a pair and will join Kean and Montclair State on the diamond Sunday to finish up the quarterfinal round.

LaGrange crushed Piedmont 23-2 and 14-1 in the USA South Tournament First Round at Cleaveland Field in Williamson Stadium on Saturday. The sweep carried the Panthers (22-7) into the tournament's championship series next weekend against either N.C. Wesleyan and William Peace. LC set or tied a number of team and USA South Tournament records in the two blowout wins. The two wins extended the Panthers' winning streak to 14 games, tying the 2016 team for the longest streak during the NCAA era of the program. The Panthers have also won 14 straight USA South Tournament games, dating back to the 2017 season. The Panthers hit a team and conference tournament record six home runs in Game 1 and added another in the second game. The Panthers' 28 home runs this season broke the mark of 27 set by the 2003 team, who played 46 games. LC also set conference tournament game records for runs (23), hits (29), and RBIs (23) in Game 1. LC had 47 hits on the day. Senior designated hitter E.J. Churchich clubbed three home runs and had nine RBIs. Churchich started the day tied for fourth on the team in home runs and fifth in RBIs. He now leads the Panthers with 37 RBIs and is second on the team with six home runs.

Behind an early outburst of runs in the first two innings, East Texas Baptist University claimed the American Southwest Conference Red Bracket championship in dominating fashion over Louisiana College, 11-5. This the second time ETBU will play in the Gold Bracket Championship also advancing in 2017. ETBU is now 29-14 on the season. "I was really proud of our guys and how they competed from the start of the game all the way through and the way we were able to finish. We had a job to do and these guys had a goal in mind and they went out and accomplished it. To me as a coach that is a very satisfying moment," said head coach Jared Hood. With a 9-6 win over Concordia Texas in the Blue Bracket final of the American Southwest Conference Championship Tournament, Texas-Dallas will move on to the league's Championship Series and will host East Texas Baptist for the best-of-three series starting Thursday at the UTD Baseball Field.

The Texas Lutheran Bulldogs will play for the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference Baseball Championship on Sunday after Saturday's 12-10 winner's bracket victory over second-ranked Trinity.  In a windy and wild affair at The Depot at Cleburne Station, the Bulldogs survived a sixth inning that had 11 combined runs scored and a couple of Trinity scoring threats late in the game, particularly in the seventh. TLU improved to 27-11 overall and will face either Trinity (27-6). TLU is the only unbeaten team remaining in the tournament and needs just one win Sunday to claim the championship. Trinity (Texas) defeated Southwestern 13-9 to set up a rematch with Texas Lutheran for the SCAC title.

Wilson College took on the Highlanders of Cairn University earlier today in the Colonial States Athletic Conference Semifinal Round. The Phoenix (21-4, 8-2 CSAC) swept the Highlanders (11-7, 8-4 CSAC) by scores of 4-3 in 10 innings and 3-2 in game two. In the bottom of the tenth inning, senior Jacob Whittington wrapped up game one with a walk-off single to right, giving the Phoenix the 4-3 victory. It was another walk-off in game two as Dean Mercer with the hot shot off the shortstop scored Brandon Cook, sending the Phoenix to the CSAC finals against Keystone this weekend.

Lancaster Bible College did something on Saturday very few teams have done this season, and in the process, the Chargers kept their season alive. Lancaster Bible stunned top-seeded Penn St. Harrisburg in game one of the North Eastern Athletic Conference Semifinals on Saturday, earning a 6-3 victory, before the Nittany Lions tied the best-of-three series with a 14-6 game two victory. Saturday's split sets up a decisive game three, which will take place on Monday in Middletown, Pa. at 1 p.m. Penn State Abington will host Penn College on Sunday in the other semi final series.

Bridgewater (Va.) and Lynchburg won their games and advanced to the Semifinal round but top seeded Randolph-Macon had trouble with Eastern Mennonite. Sophomore Ethan Iannuzzi had five hits, three walks and one hit by pitch on the day in 11 plate appearances as the 21st-ranked and top-seeded Randolph-Macon baseball team split a doubleheader with Eastern Mennonite on Saturday afternoon in the quarterfinals of the ODAC Tournament, setting up a deciding game on Sunday. The two ODAC rivals split with the Yellow Jackets taking game one 14-6.and falling 7-4 in the second. Brendon Barrett hrew a complete game and Brett Lindsay accounted for four runs as EMU beat Randolph-Macon 7-4 for their first ODAC Tournament win since 2002. 

Top-seed U.S. Merchant Marine Academy will play for the Skyline Conference Championship on Sunday after the Mariners defeated second seeded Old Westbury Panthers, 4-1, Saturday at Bartoszek Field. Old Westbury took down the fourth-seeded Maritime College Privateers 14-4 in the final elimination game. With the victory, the Panthers earned a spot in the 2021 Skyline Conference Baseball Championship finals against Merchant Marine on Sunday.

York College swept the Eastern University Eagles in the MAC Commonwealth Semifinals on Saturday in York. The Spartans won game one 9-7 and then completed the sweep with a 12-4 win in the nightcap. The Spartans improve to 26-6 as they will face the winner of Sunday's Alvernia/Lebanon Valley winner take all semifinal game in Reading, following a Split of their Saturday games, in next week's championship series. The Spartans have won five of their last six including four of five in the MAC Commonwealth tournament. Eastern sees their tournament run come to an end with a mark of 10-18.

Misericordia University swept Arcadia, 5-4, 11-1, in the MAC Freedom Semifinals, Saturday at Tambur Field. The Cougars won their 16th straight to improve to 25-7 and will face the winner of DeSales/Stevens next weekend. Brady Madden had a triple and drove in two runs in the opener and Santino Manganella and Joe Liscio both had two hits. Tom Jacob worked five scoreless innings to earn the win and Joe Valenti got the final two outs to get the save. In the nightcap, Madden and Derrick Vosburg both had three hits while Manganella, Liscio, Dante Salerno and Austin Miles all drove in two runs.

Less than an hour after enduring a heartbreaking loss in the longest game in NCAA Division III history, the third-ranked Salisbury University exacted its revenge, shutting out the Southern Virginia Knights, 10-0, in Saturday evening's Coast-to-Coast Athletic Conference showdown at Sea Gull Baseball Stadium. In a game restated on Saturday morning with Salisbury leading in the fifth inning. Cullen McAuliffe led off the bottom of the eighth with a single, then after a sac bunt the game was delayed by rain for 20 minutes. Joe Doherty pinch-ran for McAuliffe and scored the tying run on a Weddell single, making it 5-5. The Sea Gulls eventually had two on with one out but the rally got cut short by a double play. it was zeros until both team treaded runs in the 18th inning. Southern Virginia finally broke through for good in the top of the 23rd. Nate McCallum led off with a single and took second on a sac bunt. Will Parker followed with a base knock to right, scoring McCallum to put SVU up 7-6. Salisbury tried stringing together one more rally in the bottom of the 23rd. Christian Murphy led off with a base hit, but Meekins popped out on an attempt to bunt him up to second. Weddell singled to put the tying and winning runs on base, but Sky Rahill rolled into a 6-3 double play to end the game and give Southern Virginia the historic win. Occidental and Rutgers-Newark played 23 innings in March 2013.

Sophomore righty Billy Oldham pitched into the eighth inning of the opener to remain unbeaten this year, and senior leftfielder John Mesagno had three extra-base hits and drove in five runs on the day to lift Eastern Connecticut State University to 5-3, 7-1 Little East Conference wins over the University of Massachusetts Boston Saturday afternoon at Monan Park on the final day of the regular season. With its first regular-season sweep of UMass (7-7, 7-7 LEC) since 2016, Eastern (29-4, 15-1 LEC) has established a season record for LEC regular-season wins -- one more than the 2007 team (14-0) and 1997 squad (14-1). This year marks the second 16-game LEC regular season. In winning its 13th LEC regular-season title – its first outright regular-season title since 2011 – the Warriors finish three games ahead of 2019 regular-season champion University of Southern Maine and Rhode Island College, both closing at 12-4 in the conference. The Warriors end the season riding an eight-game winning streak into the LEC tournament.

Illinois College may have rallied in the last inning to win Saturday afternoon's baseball opener 5-4, but Grinnell College made sure the Blueboys didn't enjoy a repeat performance. Jared Booth blasted a two-run homer in the top of the ninth of the second game to turn a deficit into a 6-5 lead, and the Pioneers shut down the hosts in the bottom of the frame to earn a 6-5 Midwest Conference South Division victory. Nate Lu earned the pitching win for Grinnell (7-8, 7-8 MWC South) with a perfect eighth inning and Daniel Lubelfeld worked a hitless ninth for the save.

The Pacific Lutheran University baseball team utilized a one-inningscoring binge in both ends of a Northwest Conference doubleheader on Saturday, emerging from Roy Helser Field with a pair of wins at the expense of host Linfield University. The Lutes unleashed seven runs in one frame for the 10-3 win in the opener before tacking on six runs late in an 8-7 victory in the nightcap for the sweep on the penultimate day of the regular season. A seven-run explosion set the table for a decisive 10-3 victory in the series opener. The Lutes got off to a rocky start in game two, surrendering five runs in the opening inning and two more in the second. The Lutes got on the board in the top of the third and fifth, closing the gap to 7-2 before the Lutes unloaded six runs in the sixth inning.

Coe College defeated Wartburg in a doubleheader on Saturday morning at Daniels Park as the Kohawks downed the Knights 7-1 and and 14-4. Earlier in the morning, the squads resumed their suspended game from last night with Coe securing a game three win in the bottom of the 12th inning on an RBI single from Nolan Cavanaugh. In the regularly scheduled double header, the Kohawks got excellent pitching performances from starters TJ Deardorff and Matthew Mittelmark as the pair earned their eighth and fifth wins of the season. Senior TJ Johnson was stellar at the plate, racking up eight RBI on the day while hitting two homers and a double. Overall, the Kohawks had 17 hits in the second game with nine players recording at least one and four posting multi-hit games.

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology relied on a freshman to help cap a Senior Day sweep for the Fightin' Engineer baseball team on Sunday at Art Nehf Field. Freshman Manuel Lopez hit a walk-off, 3-run home run in the bottom of the 10th inning to lead Rose-Hulman past Mount St. Joseph 6-3 in the nightcap. The Fightin' Engineers previously won the opener 12-3. The seniors played a large role in the 12-3 game one victory. Petrisko scattered nine hits and allowed three runs with six strikeouts in six innings to improve to 6-1 on the season, before Ian Kline tossed the last three scoreless innings with four strikeouts.

Elmhurst University celebrated its senior day by splitting a pair of games with Wheaton College. The Bluejays fell 12-5 in game one, but rallied in game two to score a 5-4 victory. Elmhurst moved to 17-19 overall and 12-16 in the CCIW with the split while Wheaton moved to 13-23 overall and 9-19 in league play. Elmhurst honored its 12 senior players prior to the start of the contest. Wheaton scored a combined eight runs in the third and fourth inning to score a 12-5 win over Elmhurst in game one. Elmhurst rallied from a 4-3 deficit and scored a pair of runs in the bottom of the eighth to down Wheaton 5-4 in the night cap.

Senior Eric Thronson went 6-for-7 with three doubles, two walks, two runs, and five RBIs to lead the Trinity College Bantams to a 26/6-10/4 doubleheader sweep against the visiting Williams College Ephs in baseball action this afternoon on Murren Family Field at DiBenedetto Stadium. Trinity finishes the year at 11-6 and the Ephs end up at 7-6. Trinity scored 11 runs in the third inning and 10 more in the sixth in the seven-inning opener that took a bit over three hours. In game two, the Bantams scored twice in the bottom of the eighth inning to break a 4-4 tie and complete the sweep.

Two senior starting pitchers went out in style as
Muhlenberg split its season-ending doubleheader at
Washington College. Truman Devitt (pictured) pitched
into the eighth inning in the opener, combining with
freshman Sam Kelstein and junior Will Nomura on a
six-hit shutout in a 4-0 Mule win. In the nightcap,
Paul Poppert pitched eight full innings and was in line
to get the win until the Shoremen walked off with a
5-4 win in the bottom of the ninth.
Muhlenburg athletics photo

After dropping game one in extra innings, St. Olaf College won game two, 3-2, in walk-off fashion in the bottom of the ninth to snap Saint John's University's 15-game winning streak and claim a Senior Day split on Saturday at Mark Almli Field. Saint John's (27-9, 16-8 MIAC) won the opener, 7-3, in eight innings after St. Olaf (11-7, 4-6 MIAC) used a seventh-inning rally to send the game into extra innings. With the score locked at 2-2 in the home half of the ninth in game two, Joey Glampe came around to score on a throwing error by the Johnnies to give the Oles the split. The loss to St. John's ends their program best 15 game win streak.

Susquehanna finished their four-game series with Juniata College with another split Saturday afternoon as both sides each won two in the series. Susquehanna (8-15, 8-12 LC) convincingly took the first game, 8-2, behind a career-high eight strikeouts from junior Dillan Weikel to snap its 11-game skid before Juniata (12-10, 12-10 LC) used a walk-off triple for a 5-4 victory in the nightcap. Back on March 27 in Selinsgrove, Susquehanna dominated the first game, 15-5, before the Eagles claimed the second game, 8-6.

Union College scored 10 unanswered runs over the final three innings to erase a seven-run deficit and pick up a two-game sweep of Saturday's Liberty League doubleheader with Bard College at Honey Field. The Dutchmen took the first game by an 8-4 score and came back to win the second game 10-7. Senior Colin Kelly led the Union offense with a 4-for-9 effort at the plate that included two homers, five runs batted in and four runs scored. Classmate Jack Koch also had three hits, drove in a pair and scored four times for Union (9-7, 7-5 Liberty League).

Ryan Yerby allowed only five hits with nine strikeouts in a complete game to lead the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute to a 5-1 victory in the first game of a doubleheader against Vassar College before the visitors came back to capture the nightcap, 10-4. Yerby, who threw a 7-inning no hitter last week, went the full seven innings again, allowing four singles and a home run. He struck out nine of the 27 batters he faced with two walks in improving to 2-0. The Brewers jumped out to an early lead in game two and never relinquished their advantage. They scored three times on four hits in the first inning, including a two-run double by Bryce Grathwohl, and once in the second for a 4-2 lead after two innings. Vassar added four more runs in the fourth inning, highlighted by a two-RBI triple into the left centerfield gap from Alex Warren, for an 8-2 lead. The scored their final two runs in the eight inning.

Northern Vermont University-Lyndon got a pair of stellar pitching performances from Sam Ognenoff and Codi Smith in sweeping Saturday's pivotal North Atlantic Conference doubleheader from Thomas College, 2-0 and 6-2. With the wins, the Hornets improve to 11-9 on the season and 11-6 in NAC play. The Terriers fall to 10-10 overall and 9-8 in conference. Ognenoff picked up the complete game victory by scattering four hits and striking out six batters without giving up a walk. Ryan Scepansky started and went the distance for Thomas, giving up six hits and striking out four. The nightcap would start out as a pitcher's duel between Smith and Thomas starter Nicholas Howard. Neither team was able to push across a run through the first three and a half innings. Smith allowed only three hits in the game, and matched his season high by striking out 13. Howard took the loss for Thomas.

Nationally 25th-ranked Cortland completed its regular-season schedule with a pair of SUNYAC victories at Fredonia. James Varian drove in a combined seven runs in the doubleheader with a grand slam during the Red Dragons' 7-1 win in the nine-inning opener along with a two-run double and a sac fly in a 9-4 win in the seven-inning second game. The Red Dragons had already clinched the SUNYAC East title and will host Brockport, the second seed from the West, next Saturday in the first two games of a best-of-three SUNYAC semifinals. Cortland also secured the league's overall top seed and would host the best-of-three finals May 22-23 if victorious in the semifinals.