UTICA, N.Y. – After knocking off the No. 1 seed Friday, Penn College continued its impressive run by taking care of No. 2 Penn State Abington 9-5 Saturday. The win advances the Wildcats to their first-ever North Eastern Athletic Conference Baseball Championship game Sunday.
Penn College will take on the winner of Penn State-Berks and Penn State-Abington (which were still playing at press time) at 10 a.m. A second game – in the double-elimination format -- will follow the first contest, if necessary.
Trailing 5-3 after three innings, Penn College freshman
Max Bair relieved starter
Tyler Cooklin (3.1 IP, 4 hits, 5 runs, 4 walks, 0 strikeouts) and fired 5.2 innings of scoreless baseball. Bair got a lift from his offense as the Wildcats erased their deficit with six runs after the fifth.
Penn College trailed 1-0 after the first inning but pumped in three runs in the second to take a 3-1 lead.
Dylan Scaringi smacked a triple that scored
Deric Ellerman and
Noah Esposito, before scoring himself on an error.
Abington exploded in the fourth inning after Cooklin struggled on the mound. A hit by pitch, walk and a single loaded the bases for the Lions with no outs. Following a sacrifice fly to score one runner and a walk to load the bases again with no outs, Bair relieved Cooklin. Abington used a bases loaded walk for its second run of the inning before a two-run single gave the Lions a 5-3 lead.
The Wildcats pulled within one in the fifth when an error plated
Jeremy Rall to make it 5-4.
Penn College added two runs in the sixth to take the lead for good and tacked on three insurance runs in the seventh for good measure.
Cole Weachock led off the sixth with a ground-rule double, followed by a
James Simasek walk. After Esposito reached on a fielder's choice, Ellerman loaded the bases on an infield single. Scaringi plated Simasek with a sacrifice fly to right and Rall reached on an error that scored Esposito.
Evan Vigna drew a walk to lead off the seventh and
Zach Weil lined a single to left field. Weachock brought both home with a triple to right field, and later scored on a sacrifice squeeze by Esposito.
Bair allowed just two base runners the remainder of the game.
Carlos Rodriguez, Rall, Weil, Weachock, Ellerman and Scaringi all had two hits for Penn College. Weachock picked up two extra-base hits with a double and a triple, while Scaringi also recorded a triple.
Bair improved to 3-0 with five strikeouts, one walk and three hits.
