This week, the Saint Xavier men’s baseball team finished off a three-game series against the Roosevelt Lakers in which they took two out of the three games played.
On Friday, March 25, the Cougars would start this series as the road team in a game at Ozinga field. SXU found themselves down early as the Lakers jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first inning of play.
The Cougars bounced back by scoring five runs in the second, and the team was in complete control the rest of the game. The Cougars were able to tack on four runs in the fourth and five in the eighth to make this game a comfortable 17-5 victory.
The biggest contributor for the Cougars was right fielder, Daniel Barrios, who had two hits, three runs scored and four RBIs on the day.
Third baseman, Jimmy Smyth, also had an interesting day at the plate, since he was able to drive in three runs and score once while not recording a hit.
The next two games of this series were played on March 29 at Ferrell Field, because of rain delays that caused postponements on Saturday.
The Cougars blew the first game of this doubleheader 7-6, after losing a 5-2 lead in the top of the seventh inning. SXU would score once in the bottom of the seventh before a Barrios strike out ended their comeback efforts.
The Cougars did bounce back in the second Tuesday game by winning a 7-6 thriller that went into extra innings.
After a back and forth start to the game, the Cougars had a 6-5 lead heading into the top of the ninth inning.
SXU would end up blowing their second late lead of the day as the Lakers tied the game at six to force extras.
Fortunately for SXU, catcher, Evan Orzech, would hit a walk-off single in the tenth to secure both the win and the series victory.
With this series victory, the Cougars are now 24-5 on the year, and hold the top spot in Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference (CCAC) with an 8-2 record. The Cougars next game is on Wednesday, March 30, where they will travel to face the Lewis University Flyers at 3:00 p.m.