Concordia Spoils Tech Baseball Home Opener
KLAMATH FALLS, Oregon (March 21, 2008)—The Oregon Tech baseball team dropped its home opener in 11 innings, as CU came from behind to tie it in the ninth and win it on a grand slam in the 11th. OIT drops to 3-17 overall and 1-6 in conference action. Concordia improves to 6-10 on the season and 3-1 in conference play.
CU jumped on the Owls early and often, off OIT pitcher Casey Burton, pounding out nine hits in the first two innings but only putting four runs on the board. The Cavaliers were cruising until the fifth inning, when Quinn Hummel led off the bottom of the fifth with a solo shot over the right field wall and looked to be a big inning, with back-to-back singles to follow, but a fly ball to right and a ground out ended the inning. After Burton settled down, after his first two innings of work, CU did not put another hit on the board until the seventh inning but failed to score.
CU tacked on another run in the eight on a Jon Houts pinch-hit homer, that put Concordia up 5-1. In the bottom half of the inning, Ryson Mauricio led off with a double to get the Owls rolling. Corey Spires singled and the second pinch-hit home run of the game, this time by Tech’s Frank Drake, closed the gap to 5-4. Tyler Eklund then doubled and was driven in by a Sean Teaters single to tie the game at 5-5. Ryan Henry, pinch-running for Teaters, then scored on a double by Quinn Hummel to give the Owls their first lead of the game.
Two costly errors in the ninth sent CU’s Ryan Sussenguth to the plate, where his RBI single made it 6-6. Neither team scored in the first extra frame, but Sussenguth came through in the clutch again, going deep with the bases loaded to put Concordia up 10-6 and winning by the same score, as OIT failed to plate anymore runs.
Tech’s Quinn Hummel was 3-4 at the plate with 2 RBI while Frank Drake drove in three runs on his blast in the eight inning. Both Cory Spires and Ryson Mauricio finished with two hits each. Shane Bedortha pitched three innings of brilliant relief work, but picked up the loss.
Concordia’s Roberto Reyes and Ryan Sussenguth each had four hits on the day with Sussenguth adding six RBI in the win. Brett Hawley picked up the win in relief for the Cavaliers.
Both teams will meet on Saturday 3/22, with the conference double-header scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. at Kiger Stadium in Klamath Falls.
-OIT-