E-town sweeps Albright with pair of comebacks, Smith gets win No. 150

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Box Scores (Enhanced): Game 1 | Game 2
Box Scores (HTML): Game 1 | Game 2

Game 1: Elizabethtown 7, Albright 6
Game 2: Elizabethtown 7, Albright 6

ELIZABETHTOWN, Pa. Ryan Haggerty homered and hit a seventh-inning walk-off single to cap Elizabethtown's three-run comeback in game one of a Commonwealth Conference doubleheader against Albright Friday afternoon at Kevin Scott Boyd Stadium. The Blue Jays, who got coach Cliff Smith his 150th career victory with the 7-6 win in game one, staged another rally in the sixth inning of game two to earn another 7-6 victory and the sweep.

Albright forced the Blue Jays into a precarious position with four runs in the fourth inning and a combined six runs over the fourth, fifth and sixth innings. Enter Sean Jones and Haggerty.

Jones tied the game, 6-6, on a two-out, two-run single to right field against Lions' (8-8, 1-5 CC) closer Zach Graham. One batter later, Haggerty sent his teammates storming out of the dugout on his game-winning hit to right center that scored Dillon Tagle. All three runs in the seventh inning went unearned due to a botched grounder by Albright second baseman Nate Peiffer.

Elizabethtown (10-13, 5-4 CC) knocked around Albright pitching for the second game in a row with 11 hits. Haggerty had three, including a two-run home run to right —his second of the season— off Albright starter Jared Neiheiser in the second. The Blue Jays added 12 more in game two, bringing their series total to 37. Three of the team's top eight hitting performances this season came in Thursday and Friday's games.

Jones, Tagle and Kyle Gable all finished with two hits apiece. Gable, who recorded his 100th career hit Wednesday at Dickinson, also scored twice and stole his ninth base of the season. The redshirt junior was 2-for-4 in each game Friday, and now has six hits over his last three games.

Jake Hoffstein pitched two scoreless innings for his first win. Starter Rob Cressman went the first five innings and allowed six runs on seven hits, though the Pitman, N.J. native deserved a better fate.

Only four of the six runs scored against Neiheiser by the Jays were earned.

Game two nearly mirrored game one through five and a half innings. E-town took an early lead only to watch the visitors steal it in the middle innings.

A sacrifice fly by Luke Gatti, a groundout from Tagle and Jones' solo homer to left put the blue and gray ahead 3-0 after one, but Albright scored the next four runs to lead 4-3 heading to the bottom of the sixth. Leading hitter Collin Hecker scored Max Dundore and Jared Ruppert with a single into left field, and Dylan Boll singled home Hecker to tie the game 3-3 in the third.

The Lions went ahead 4-3 on Zachary Kiebler's RBI double in the sixth that found just enough daylight inside the third base bag.

Elizabethtown stayed poised, eventually scoring four times in the sixth to open up a 7-4 lead. With pinch-runner Mike Stobbe on first, Haggerty executed a hit-and-run to perfection by punching a ball into the gap in left center. Stobbe came all the way around to score the tying run.

The game-tying hit ended Alex Myers' day, though his line got worse when Weary greeted reliever Seth Heffner to the game with a two-run single on the first pitch he saw. Myers gave up seven earned runs on 10 hits over 5.2 innings.

Weary had his eight-game hitting streak snapped in game one, but responded with three hits and two RBIs to lead the Blue Jays in game two. The third baseman and Carlisle grad hit .500 (6-for-12) in the series with Albright.

Josh Sollenberger only faced five batters, but E-town's sixth-inning rally put the freshman in the driver's seat for his second win. Andy Breault recorded both of his outs in the seventh via strikeout for his first save. Starter Dylan Manning lasted 5.1 innings and allowed four Lion runs on seven hits. Manning walked three and struck out one.

Coach Smith's 150th victory came in his 265th game. Now in his seventh season, Smith led the team to Commonwealth Conference Championships and NCAA Division III Tournament appearances in 2007 and 2009. He is the fourth winningest coach in program history behind only Owen Wright (258 wins), John Gergic (228) and Ira Herr (196).

The Blue Jays return to Boyd Stadium Tuesday for a non-conference game against Juniata at 4 p.m.