YORK, Pa. – In just under two hours, the Wesley College baseball team defeated St. Mary's, 6-1, in an elimination game of the Capital Athletic Conference Tournament on Friday afternoon at York's Jaquet Field. The Wolverines improve to 16-14 on the year while the Seahawks fall to 18-19.
Eric Willey scattered just five hits and allowed just one run over seven innings to pick up his fourth win of the season. The sophomore from Seaford, Del., also struck out one and walked one while throwing just 85 pitches.
Wesley never trailed in the game, scoring a run in the opening inning when a throwing error allowed Cory Smith to score. Smith reached earlier in the frame by drawing a walk and stole second base and came across the plate when Conner Gobright reached on the error by shortstop Luke Green.
Tyler Hunter, who went 2-4 on the day, singled home another run in the fifth, giving the Wolverines a 2-0 lead. Adam Darling scored on the play after being issued a one-out walk, followed by a groundball out by Cody Dmiterchik which advanced him 90 feet.
St. Mary's was finally able to get to Willey in the sixth with a run on two hits but Wiley was able to get out of the inning without any more damage and also retired the side in the seventh, giving way to Andrew Cooper. Cooper pitched a 1-2-3 eighth and allowed a pair of singles in the ninth but picked up his fifth win of the season.
Cooper got some extra cushion before coming into the game as Wesley added two more runs off Seahawks starting pitcher Michael O'Neill in the eighth to make the score 4-1. Darling started the inning with a single and advanced into scoring position on a sacrifice bunt by Dmiterchik. Hunter then singled and stole second to put a pair of runners into scoring position and after a wild pitch allowed Darling to score, Hunter added another run on a sacrifice fly by Smith.
Patrick Wats relieved O'Neill for the ninth but he did not fare much better, allowing RBI base knocks by Stan Zulkowski and Darling.
Darling finished the day going 2-for-3 with a pair of runs as well as a walk.