The Saint Xavier Cougar baseball team played three games against Judson University this weekend and managed to pick up one win.
The lone victory moved their season record to 6-15 and their conference record to 1-2 as of Monday.
Vachon Victorious
Senior pitcher Scott Vachon earned his first victory of the season against Judson in the first game of a doubleheader on Saturday.
Vachon had been pitching just well enough to lose before this win. After his win, the 6-7 right-hander now has five starts, three complete games, 28 strikeouts and a .252 batting average against in 32 innings of work this season.
In the first game against Judson he went all seven innings and gave up two runs on seven hits and two walks with five strikeouts to pick up the 4-2 win.
Senior right fielder Chris Klein continued to be the best position player for the Cougars. He put together a solid 2-for-3 showing at the plate that included a run scored.
Senior left fielder Brad Myjak, who has struggled offensively with a .153 batting average and a .247 on-base percentage, went 1-for-3 in the game. He knocked in two of the Cougars’ four runs with a two-out, first-inning double.
The Cougars picked up the rest of their runs in the third inning when first-year infielder Tom Hayes came on to pinch hit for junior infielder Damon Softcheck.
Hayes came to the plate with the bases loaded and two out. His single drove in first-year third baseman Bryan Polak and senior first baseman Thomas Keating, giving the Cougars all the runs they would need to win behind Vachon’s pitching performance.
Two Losses Spoil Weekend
The Cougars did not have their best fortune in the next two games of the weekend series. They lost game two of the doubleheader 5-3 and dropped their Sunday game 8-7.
Klein started the second game of the doubleheader on Saturday and gave up a run in the first inning but appeared ready to settle down.
Then the fourth inning came along and Klein and struggled to get any outs. He gave up three runs on three hits, an error and a hit batsman before getting out of the inning on a double play.
The Cougars tried to help out their starter with a solid offensive seventh inning after having scored just one run in the first six.
Hayes again came on to pinch hit, this time for first-year catcher Ryan Pellack with runners on second and third.
Hayes again came through, this time with a single that scored Softcheck and Polak to make it a 5-3 ballgame.
That would be all the offense Saint Xavier could muster.
Sunday’s game was good for those who prefer offensive shootouts.
Junior pitcher Dan Wetzel took the ball for the Cougars and managed to leave the game with a one-run lead despite giving up four runs in seven innings.
That lead would be demolished in a three-run ninth inning for Judson that ended on a walk-off single.
All three of the ninth-inning runs were unearned because of an error on a fielder’s choice by Keating.
First-year pitcher Adrian Luna was charged with the loss when he could not pitch around the problems caused by the error.
Luna allowed both runners to advance a base because of a wild pitch he threw directly ahead of the game-winning single.
Home, Sweet Home
For the first time this season the Cougars hope to play home baseball.
Should the weather finally permit, the Cougars will have a home-and-home weekend series against Trinity International University that would feature a game at Saint Xavier on Friday and a doubleheader at Trinity International on Saturday.
With home baseball and Chicago weather actually threatening to be conducive to playing ball, now is the time for the Cougars to make a charge.
They have a chance to make a move up the CCAC conference standings in the month of April. Of their 25 scheduled April games, all but three are conference contests.
For a team that missed the conference tournament by one game on the final day of the season last year, making the tournament is all they can ask for.
Tim Carroll
Senior Sports Editor
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