Pitching prevails in Pride's long lasting doubleheader sweep over William Penn
OSKALOOSA, Iowa - Returning to action for the first time in over a week, the Clarke University baseball team was able to pull off a doubleheader sweep in their series opener against William Penn University on Monday.
The Pride and Statesmen played 19 total innings in their scheduled pair of seven-inning contests as Clarke pulled out a 5-2 win in the opener then broke through in the 12th inning of the day's finale for a 3-1 win in extra innings.
CU used a combined four pitchers on the day as they combined to allow just the three runs, only one of which was earned, on 11 hits and seven walks, with 27 total strikeouts. Both game's starting pitchers went at least five innings with Tyson Tucker going an even five for the win in the opener with only two hits and a walk while striking out seven batters to move to 5-1 on the year as Devan Quesada went 5.1 innings with five strikeouts, five hits, and a walk allowed.
Relievers Isaac Rohde and Carsie Walker had strong performances out of the Pride bullpen with Rohde appearing in both games for a total of 2.2 innings as he closed out the opening win with two innings to strike out seven batters with one strikeout including a runner reaching base on a dropped third strike to allow Rohde to strike out more batters than he retired in his outing. Walker pitched in more innings out of the pen than Quesada did starting game two as Walker struck out eight batters in six necessary shutout innings while allowing four hits and three walks.
In the extra inning contest, a leadoff single from Johnny Blake to start the 12th followed by two sacrifice bunts, one allowing a the batter to reach on an error, set CU with runners on second and third with one out as Bubba Thompson sent a sacrifice fly to center field to take the lead and Bryce Simon added the extra insurance run with a two-out RBI single to push it to that 3-1 lead.
A three-run second inning in the opener helped Tucker and the Pride jump out to an early lead as Taiga Sato, Bailin Markridge, and Victor Lara drove in runs in the inning as Thompson and Markridge were responsibile for insurance tallies later in the game to help build a 5-1 lead with RBIs in the fourth and sixth respectively. Markridge finished with a unique statline with no official at bats over three plate appearances but also lowered his on base percentage on the day with a pair of sacrifice flies to drive in runs and walked in his other trip to the plate.
Clarke baseball will finish up their series at William Penn on Tuesday when they start their doubleheader with the first pitch of the first game scheduled for 1:00 p.m. CT in Oskaloosa, Iowa.