MARIETTA, Ohio — Marietta College and No. 23 ranked Ohio Northern University split a key Ohio Athletic Conference baseball doubleheader Saturday (April 18) at Don Schaly Stadium. With a near capacity crowd on hand for the 17th annual Community Day festivities, the Etta Express rolled to a 13-0 win in game one. Ohio Northern bounced back to post a 6-4 win in the nightcap.
The Pioneers are 18-12 on the season and 9-5 in the OAC. Ohio Northern moves to 23-7 overall and 9-5 in conference play.
Junior
Christian Herstine (Beaver, Pa./Beaver Area) (4-3) dominated the Polar Bear hitters for 8.0 innings. Herstine scattered five singles and struck out five without issuing a walk. After allowing a couple of base runners in the first inning, he retired 12 straight Polar Bears as the Marietta offense built a 7-0 lead. Freshman
Scott Oberhelman (Washington Twp., N.J./Old Tappan) pitched the ninth.
Marietta wasted no time in getting to ONU ace Nick Eltzroth.
Tim McCoy (Willoughby/St. Ignatius) led off the first with a single and
Mitch Geers (West Chester/Lakota East) followed with a double to the wall in right center for a 1-0 lead.
The Pioneers added six more in the second inning. Geers drove in another run with a single to left.
Ryan Hanahan (Gibsonia, Pa./Pine-Richland) ripped a two-run triple and
Chris Winpigler (Frederick, Md./Tuscarora) smacked a two-run home run over the leftfield fence.
Eltzroth (6-2), who entered the game with a sterling 1.32 earned run average, was chased in the fifth inning after allowing four more runs. All told, he allowed 11 runs, all earned, on 12 hits in 4.2 innings of work.
Christian Demko (Xenia/Bellbrook) knocked in the first two runs in the fifth with a single up the middle. McCoy plated Demko with a double to center, while Geers scored McCoy with a single to centerfield forcing the Polar Bears to go to the bullpen.
Chris Petrucci (Farmington, W.Va./Notre Dame) and
Doug Bennett (New Castle, Pa./Shenango) each drove in a run in the bottom of the eighth inning extending the Pioneer lead to 13-0.
Geers finished 3-for-4 with a double and three RBI. McCoy, Hanahan, Petrucci, Demko and
Jake Newton (Lancaster/Bloom Carroll) each had two of Marietta's 15 hits in the game.
In the second game,
Eric White (North Royalton/North Royalton) staked the Etta Express to an early 2-0 lead. ONU starter Alex Crabtree walked Geers, hit Hanahan with a pitch and walked Winpigler to load the bases with one out. White singled to shallow right field scoring Geers and Hanahan. Winpigler was thrown at trying to get to third base.
The lead was short-lived as Ohio Northern tied the score, 2-2, with a two-run home run off the bat of Matthew Mattaes in the second. A successful double steal in the fifth inning gave ONU its first lead of the day. Brandon Kasberg scampered home on the front end of a first and third double steal.
Dan Belliveau led off the top of the sixth with a solo shot over the right field wall to make it 4-2 and sending Marietta starter
Tommy Crowl (Cincinnati/Summit Country Day) to the showers. ONU added another run in the inning and another in the eight for a 6-2 lead.
White picked up his third RBI with a run-scoring single in the hoe half of the eighth. Marietta's final run came in the ninth when
Tyler Packanik (Plant City, Fla./Newsome) scored on a ground ball from Geers.
Crabtree (5-0) went 6.2 innings to get the win. He allowed two runs on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts. T.J. Storer tossed 2.1 innings to notch his third save. Storer gave up two runs on five hits.
Crowl (4-2) pitched 5.0 innings in the losing effort. He allowed four runs on eight hits with a pair of strikeouts. Freshman
David Stover (Pittsburgh, Pa./Thomas Jefferson) gave up two runs on six hits in 2.0 innings of work, while
Ian Luttrell (River Forest, Ill./Oak Park River Forest) pitched 2.0 shutout innings.
White finished 2-for-4 with three RBI, while Geers had Marietta's lone extra base hit, a double.
Marietta is back in action on Sunday (April 19) when the Pioneers host Thiel College for a single nonconference game. Originally scheduled as a 4:00 p.m. start, the game has been moved up and will begin at 1:00 p.m.
Fans can follow the Etta Express all season long at
pioneers.marietta.edu. You can also follow the Pioneers on Facebook at
facebook.com/MariettaCollege and @MariettaPioneer on Twitter and Instagram.
