Down to last strike, Tommies stay alive... and get sweep

No. 13-ranked St. Thomas (23-5 overall, 12-0 MIAC) extended its season win streak to 14 and its home-field victory streak to 53 with Saturday's 9-8, 14-1 MIAC baseball wins over Concordia-Moorhead (12-11, 4-6) at Koch Diamond.

The Toms' Waylon Bemboom had a one-out, bases-loaded walk-off single in the eighth inning of game one.

UST led 5-0 early but trailed 8-6 into its final at-bat in the seventh inning. Tim Kuzniar doubled and later scored on a sacrifice fly. The Tommies still trailed 8-7 down to their last strike before Brady Johnson's two-out single tied the game 8-8.

Tommy Danczyk, UST's fifth pitcher, came on in the top of the eighth inning with two outs and the go- ahead runner on third base and got an inning-ending ground out.

In UST's half of the eighth, a one-out double by Jack Hogan, an intentional walk, a wild pitch, and another intentional walk preceded Bemboom's deep liner into the gap in left-center that goes down as a game-winning RBI single.

Hogan and Ben Podobinski had five hits on the day in the sweep, while Kelvin Stroik had four. Tyler Peterson drove in six runs on the day. Tim Kuzniar had three hits and now has 197 on his career in his quest to become the 10th conference player to reach 200.

Peterson, J.D. Dorgan and Podobinski each homered in game two. Zach Franz allowed two hits, two walks and one run in five innings for his 10th career victory.

St. Thomas had a fielding error on the first play of game one but had no errors in the next 68 defensive chances the rest of the day.

St. Thomas has seven one-run wins in its 12-0 MIAC start.

The Toms play second-place Bethel (9-1) Tuesday on the road for a conference doubleheader.