UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS, Ohio — Pitching ruled the day as Marietta College and John Carroll University split an Ohio Athletic Conference doubleheader Saturday (April 25) afternoon. The Etta Express took game one, 5-0, while John Carroll avoided the sweep with a 2-1 win in the nightcap.
Marietta moves to 20-15 on the season and 10-6 in the OAC. The Blue Streaks are 22-11 overall and 11-5 in league play.
Junior
Christian Herstine (Beaver, Pa./Beaver Area) (5-3) scattered eight John Carroll hits en route to the complete-game shutout. The Pioneer ace struck out eight and walked only one over 9.0 innings.
The Pioneers jumped on top in the first inning.
Chris Winpigler (Frederick, Md./Tuscarora) tripled into the right center gap scoring
Ryan Hanahan (Gibsonia, Pa./Pine-Richland), who reached on a two-out single. Winpigler would go on to collect four of Marietta's 12 hits in the game.
Marietta used some more two-out lightning in the third inning.
Mitch Geers (West Chester/Lakota East) got the ball rolling with a single through the left side of the infield. Hanahan smacked a double to left scoring Geers and Winpigler followed with a single down the leftfield line plating Hanahan for a 3-0 Pioneer lead.
Unearned runs in the fifth and sixth innings pushed the advantage to 5-0.
Tyler Packanik (Plant City, Fla./Newsome) drove in Geers with a sac fly in the fifth, while a bases-loaded walk to
Tim McCoy (Willoughby/St. Ignatius) scored
Jake Newton (Lancaster/Bloom Carroll). Defensive miscues by the Blue Streaks prolonged both innings for the Pioneers.
Aaron Lapaglia (4-1) started on the mound for John Carroll and took the loss. He worked 7.0 innings and gave up five runs, three earned, on 11 hits. Lapaglia walked two and struck out seven. Tyler Ferretti threw the final 2.0 innings allowing one hit.
In addition to Winpigler's four hits, Geers and Hanahan each had two hits, including a double, and scored twice for the Pioneers.
Drew Doring and
Tommy Crowl (Cincinnati/Summit Country Day) went toe-to-toe in game two with Doring pulling out the victory. The JCU senior allowed one unearned run on just three hits in 9.0 innings on the mound. He walked three and struck out eight to improve to 9-0 on the season.
Crowl (4-3) was equally impressive. The lefthander allowed two runs on eight hits in 8.0 innings of work. He had three strikeouts and didn't walk a Blue Streak hitter.
Packanik put the Etta Express in front with a run in the top of the first. McCoy and Geers started the inning off with walks. Fallowing a strikeout, Winpigler reached on an error to load the bases.
Packanik grounded back to Doring who turned and threw to second base trying to get the double play. Packanik beat the throw to first allowing McCoy to score.
John Carroll evened the score with a run in the home half of the first. Rob Cifelli and Bobby Sabatino singled and then pulled off a double steal. With runners at second and third, Tyler Gentile grounded out to short allowing Cifelli to score.
The score remained tied at 1-1 until the bottom of the seventh. David Crowley ripped a one-out triple down the leftfield line. Crowl struck out Jacob Schriner and was one out away from getting out of the inning when James Molnar delivered a single to center plating Crowley with the go ahead run.
The Pioneers left runners in scoring position in both the eighth and ninth innings but couldn't get the RBI base hit.
Marietta hosts Case Western Reserve University on Tuesday (April 28) at Don Schaly Stadium. First pitch for the nonconference doubleheader is set for 3:30 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.
