May 24, 2024

Super-Regionals - Day One

More news about: Birmingham-Southern | Endicott | Lynchburg | Misericordia | Pomona-Pitzer | Randolph-Macon | Salve Regina | UW-La Crosse
 
Pomona-Pitzer, with a 6-4 opening day win in the 2024 super-regional round is now 3-1 against East Texas Baptist this year in Marshall, Texas.
Pomona-Pitzer athletics photo

 

For six of the eight hosts, they will need two wins on Saturday as they dropped the Friday openers to their visitors. Endicott and Randolph-Macon won the games they hosted in the final inning. The Gulls needed an extra inning while the Yellow Jackets finished their game in regulation.

Johns Hopkins batters feasted on regional pitching as the homer-happy team came into Beverly, Mass. without a loss in the 2024 NCAA playoffs. It was a home run, a two-run home run by Danny MacDougall in the top of the tenth inning that sent No. 1 ranked Endicott to a 7-5 win over No. 6 Johns Hopkins University on Friday afternoon in the opening game of a best-of-three NCAA Super Regional series at North Field. With Endicott playing as the visiting team in game one due to NCAA Super Regional rules, Dylan Pacheco led off the top of the tenth with a single to right. He then moved to second on a wild pitch and to third on ground out by Nicolas Notarangelo before MacDougall came to the plate and launched his seventh home run of the season over the fence in left giving the Gulls a 7-5 edge. Evan Scully returned to the bump for his second inning of work in the bottom of the frame and sat Johns Hopkins down in order, securing the game one victory for Endicott. Scully retired all six batters he faced to earn his third win of the season. Johns Hopkins, who averages 13.2 runs per game, entered today having totaled 105 runs over its previous six postseason contests, but was able to produce just five runs this afternoon – its lowest output since April 27 and its third-lowest output of the season.

Senior Matt Myers knocked in the game-winning run in the bottom of the ninth for the team's first lead as 24th-ranked Randolph-Macon pulled out a 6-5 win over Adrian in game one of the Ashland, Va. Super Regional. RMC played from behind for most of the day as Adrian scored two in the first and one in the second before the Yellow Jackets got on the scoreboard in the bottom of the second. Adrian added single runs in the fifth and sixth before RMC put up another crooked number in the bottom of the sixth to pull within one at 5-4 and tied it in the seventh. Junior Sam Slevin took the mound in the top of the ninth. Back-to-back singles with one away again put the potential go-ahead run on second. Slevin turned a come backer into a 1-6-3 double play to end the threat. Zach Wernoski worked a leadoff walk and sent to second when Myles Webb reached on a bunt single. Chaz Harvey bunted to the mound and the pitcher made a bad throw to third, loading the bases. Myers, who was a defensive replacement for Aiden Pinto in left an inning earlier, ripped a long hit over the left fielder's head to plate Wernoski with the game-winner.

Despite a 44-minute rain delay in the top of the first inning, both starting pitchers were unfazed and put together a pair of outstanding postseason performances in the NCAA Newport News Super Regional opener on Friday afternoon as 11th-ranked Misericordia nipped the 10th-ranked Christopher Newport Captains in a 3-1 final. Sophomore Brandon Cassedy was the tough-luck losing pitcher for the Captains despite eight strong frames against the pesky Cougars lineup. In game one of the first Super Regional in program history, the Captains took a 1-0 lead after three innings courtesy of a solo home run by senior Scott Crosson. Misericordia snuck across an unearned run in the fifth to tie the game and then got a go-ahead single with two outs in the top of the seventh before adding an insurance run in the eighth. It was the 11th time this season that Misericordia scored the game-winning run in the seventh inning or later when Owen Cordner singled home Joe Comins against Cassedy. Prior to the inning, Cassedy had cruised through six with just one hit allowed and one unearned run.

Pomona-Pitzer took game one of the NCAA Super Regional Series 6-4 over East Texas Baptist on Friday afternoon at Woods Field. With the win, the Sagehens are one win away from advancing to the NCAA College World Series for the first time in program history. The Sagehens were led by JC Ng who went a perfect 3-3 at the plate while Nate Jakobs had the biggest swing of the afternoon going 1-4 with a two-run homer. Peter Savas also had a multi-hit game while Greg Pierantoni, Jack Gold, Jimmy Legg, and Cooper Berry had hits as well. Jake Hilton got the start for game one of the NCAA Super Regional and went 6.1 innings with three runs surrendered off of six hits and four strikeouts. Eric Prough came in for relief and ended up picking up the win to improve to 6-4 on the season. The turning point of the game came in the sixth as the Sagehens plated three runs in the inning. Jakobs got the rally started with a two-run bomb to right field and Berry followed with an RBI single later in the inning to give the Sagehens their first lead of the game at 4-3. ETBU came back to tie the game on a two-out RBI single to right field, but the Sagehens reclaimed the lead in their next at-bats with RBIs from Legg and Berry to take a 6-4 lead that Prough made stand up.

Birmingham-Southern defeated No. 2 Denison 10-1 to put themselves a win away from the College World Series behind the pitching of Drake LaRoche. Denison got on the board in the top of the first, but Ian Hancock's sac fly in the bottom of the inning tied the game at one. Charlie Banks then singled immediately after to give BSC a 2-1 lead. With LaRoche dealing on the mound, the Panthers added runs for a 10-1 lead that proved to be the final score. Birmingham-Southern was not forced into a pitching change all afternoon as Drake LaRoche retired batter after batter. He held the Big Red scoreless for eight consecutive innings and went on to pitch a complete game with 127 pitches thrown.

The University of Lynchburg made their first step to defending their 2023 National Championship a successful one as they defeated La Verne 7-1 in game one of the NCAA super regionals playing on the La Verne campus diamond. Wesley Arrington nearly pitched a third straight complete game, going eight innings with one earned run. Colin McGuire closed out the ninth win in a row for the Hornets. Through the first five innings Arrington was locked in a pitcher's duel with La Verne's starter Niko Urquidi. The Leopards got on the board first with a single run in the sixth and the Hornets answered in the seventh. Brandon Garcia hit a double and came around to score on an error, tying the game 1-1. In the next inning, Lynchburg scored six runs on only two hits in the eighth to blow the game open. McGuire pitched to four batters in the ninth to close out the game getting Lynchburg on the precipice of advancing to the NCAA 2024 Division III baseball championship.

UW-La Crosse proved that they can win a low scoring contest after slugging their way to a regional win last weekend. The Eagles used strong pitching and defense to lead them past UW-Whitewater 3-2 in game one of the NCAA super regional hosted by UW-Whitewater on Friday afternoon. In the first inning UW-La Crosse scored all the runs they would need. Nate Witte and Chris VandenHeuvel led off with back-to-back walks. After a fly out by Mac Born moved Witte to third, George Seaman walked to load the bases. Anthony Vivian then grounded out to first which scored Witte to give UWL a 1-0 lead. Jack Olver then singled to score both VandenHeuvel and Seaman to extend UWL's lead to 3-0. From this point the ball was in the hands of starting pitcher Tyler Schmitt. Schmitt would give up a pair of runs in the fifth and in the seventh inning give way to Caleb Matl. Isaiah Katz would come on in relief to start the eighth inning for the Eagles and survive several comeback attempts by the Warhawks to get the save.

In the battle of the birds game one went to the Seahawks. No 8 Salve Regina University took game one of the three-game NCAA Super Regional, 9-8, over No. 9 Salisbury University with the help of a pair of three-run homers from Tyler Cannoe and Brady Smolinski. "It's a good feeling to help our team win," said Cannoe. "I'm just thankfull to be able to have the opportunity to do what I've done today. Despite giving Salve Regina a six run cushion, Salisbury took a 7-6 in the top of the fifth. Salve Regina charged ahead, scoring three runs in the top of the fifth inning to put themselves ahead once again. Salisbury never quit but could draw no closer than one run. The Sea Gulls faced the fierce lineup of Brayden Clark, Tommy DelVecchio, Jason Arrigo and Kyle Carozza on the mound. "The game was going back and forth," said Arrigo. "It was a good feeling to throw some zeros in there, get the hitters back in the dugout and go back to work. It was a full team effort. I told Kyle when he was running in from the bullpen that it was his spot and I full trusted him to be able to close the door—he did so."