UW-Whitewater athletics photo

Ernie Banks would be proud.  UW-Whitewater played three times Saturday in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Tournament at Prucha Field at James B. Miller Stadium in Whitewater, winning all three to capture the WIAC Tournament championship to go along with its WIAC championship earned for the regular season.  UW-W, 36-7, also earns the league's automatic berth into the NCAA III Baseball Championship Tournament, the seventh consecutive NCAA bid for the Warhawks.  UW-W, the top seed as the WIAC champion, opened the day with an 8-1 win over UW-Stevens Point to knock the Pointers out of the double elimination tourney, followed with a 6-4 ten inning victory over UW-La Crosse in game two, and wrapped up the day with a 17-5 win over La Crosse that was shortened to seven innings because of the run differential rule.  Whitewater will begin play in the NCAA tournament at home, probably Wednesday, hosting a regional.   The teams that will join Whitewater, and complete schedule for the regional, will be announced late Sunday night.

Game one ... UW-Whitewater 8, UW-Stevens Point 1

Whitewater's Scott Plaza (Arlington Heights, IL/Prospect) came through in game one.  After using nine pitchers in splitting a pair of games Friday UW-W needed someone to eat up innings.  Plaza came through with 8.2 innings of work, giving up eight hits and one walk while striking out five to raise his record to 6-2.  Point scored its only run in the second, and Whitewater scored all it needed, tallying three times, in the third.  With one out Jared Fon (Germantown/Germantown) doubled to left center and Dylan followed with an infield single.  With two outs Michael Gonzalez (Delavan/Delavan-Darien) walked to load the bases.  Whitewater's Casey Power (Ontario, Canada/Belle River) reached on an error, scoring Fon to tie the game 1-1.  Nick Kuhlmann (Minneapolis, MN/Minneapolis Southwest) drew a walk to force in the second run, and Gonzalez scored on a passed ball.

Whitewater added three more in the sixth, one on a double by Fon and two on Mikole Pierce (DePere/DePere)'s ninth home run of the year for a 6-1 lead.  The Warhawks added single tallies in the seventh and eighth. 

Fon, the Warhawks' leadoff man, led all batters with a 4x4 game that included a pair of doubles.  He also reached base on a hit by pitch. 

The loss leaves Stevens Point with a 29-11 record, with four of those losses (in five meetings) coming at the hands of Whitewater.

Game two ... Whitewater 6, La Crosse 4

Trey Cannon (Palatine, IL/Palatine)'s two out, two run single in the tenth inning provided the winning margin in game two.  La Crosse scored three times in the second to jump in front, but Whitewater pulled within one with single runs in the fourth and sixth.  Runs batted in from Fon and Dylan Friend (Burlington/Burlington) in the seventh gave UW-W its first lead of the game, 4-3.  The Eagles knotted it at 4-4 in the bottom of the eighth, setting up Cannon's clutch hit.  In the top of the tenth Whitewater loaded the bases with no outs, but one out came on an infield grounder that cut the runner down at the plate.  The next batter struck out --- and then Cannon came through. 

Gonzalez duplicated Fon's game one feat, going 4x4.  Friend and Cannon added three hits apiece. With pitches and innings piling up, UW-W's Curtis Morgan (Green Lake/Green Lake) and Colin Grove (Beloit/Memorial) spared some teammates arms, with Morgan going the first seven innings and giving up four runs, three earned, and Grove (3-0) picking up the win with three innings of one hit relief.

Game three ... Whitewater 17, La Crosse 5 (7 innings)

Whitewater led just 1-0 after two innings, but after La Crosse tied the game in the top of the third the Warhawk bats heated up with five runs in the inning.  Fon singled in a run, Pierce doubled in two, and Power brought in three with a triple for a 6-1 lead.  The Eagles came back with four in the sixth to pull within 6-5, but the Warhawks followed up with their biggest inning of the season, scoring eleven times in their half of the sixth.  Power drove in the first run of the inning with a single to center, Cannon knocked in two with a double, and Dylan Bersch (Pulaski/Pulaski) scored Cannon with a two-bagger.  It continued with a run scoring single off the bat of Fon, Friend's RBI double, a two run single by Pierce, and, fittingly, Power wrapped up the scoring with a three run homerun over the left field fence. 

Pierce led the Warhawks with five RBI's and Power went 4x4.  Austin Jones (Wauwatosa/Wauwatosa West), 6-1, pitched into the sixth to earn the win.

UW-Whitewater has won nine of the last twelve WIAC baseball titles, adding league tournament crowns four times in that span.

Visit uwwsports.com on Monday for more information about the NCAA DIII Whitewater Regional.