SXU Athletics
Tuesday
The Saint Xavier baseball team battled Holy Cross College in a doubleheader. The Cougars were dominated in both games as they could not get a lot of offense in either game. This issue was also compounded by the pitching staff, who did not have a great day either.
Game one started out awfully for the Cougars, as they gave up five runs in the first inning to allow the Saints to gain a huge 5-0 lead. This was a trend for the next three innings as the Cougars offense could not get anything going in the second, third, and fourth inning.
Meanwhile, Holy Cross capitalized on Saint Xavier’s offensive deficiencies in that same time frame, scoring three runs in the second, six runs in the third, and five runs in the fourth to give the Saints a huge 19-0 lead.
The Cougars scored a run in the top of the fifth inning off of an RBI double by shortstop Alec Barnhart, but that was all they would get in game one as Holly Cross would thrash the Cougars by the score of 19-1.
The Cougars’ offense was abysmal in game one as the Cougars could only muster up 4 hits in 27 at-bats. Also, their walk-strikeout ratio was not good as they struck out eight times while only drawing three walks.
The second game started out much differently from game one as the Cougars was the first team to score in the top of the second thanks to a home run by designated hitter Tom Hayes to give the Cougars a 1-0 lead.
The Saints would rally though, scoring two runs in the bottom of the third to take the lead at 2-1. The Cougars was the ones to rally in the top of the fifth inning, scoring two runs to re-take the lead at 3-2. The two runs came off a two RBI double by Barnhart.
The Cougars’ slim lead was short lived though as Holy Cross answered right back in the bottom of the fifth inning with two runs of their own to re-take the lead at 4-3. Holy Cross would dominate the play from this point forward as they scored two runs in the sixth and seventh inning to extend their lead to 8-3.
Their pitching also stepped up, not allowing the Cougars to rally at any point in the later innings. They would complete their sweep of the Cougars, holding on to their five run lead to take game two by the score of 8-3.
The Cougars’ offense once again did not show up for game two as they could only drive in three runs for the whole game. On top of that, the defense and pitching did not do well as the defense committed four errors which resulted in six total runs being scored by the Saints off of pitcher Matthew McKenzie.
After getting swept, the Cougars’ record stood 9-23 with a conference record of 7-16.
Friday
The Saint Xavier baseball team played Saint Ambrose University in a doubleheader. The Cougars held leads in both games, but could not hold on to them as they would end up being swept.
The Cougars would start out on fire as they would score two runs in the first inning to take an early 2-0 lead. After a run by St. Ambrose in the bottom of the first inning to cut their deficit to 2-1, the Cougars would once again score two runs to make the score 4-1 after two innings of play.
After a scoreless fourth inning, the Cougars’ offense would explode in the fourth inning, scoring four runs to double their run total to eight runs and giving the Cougars a 8-1 lead.
After the Fighting Bees scored one run in the bottom of the fourth to make the score 8-2, the Cougars would score three more runs in the top of the fifth to extend the Cougars’ lead to 11-2.
With a nine run lead, you would think that the Cougars would have had this game in the bag. Sadly, they did not as Saint Ambrose would go on the offensive for the rest of the game. In the bottom of the fifth, the Fighting Bees would go on a surge, scoring five runs to cut their deficit to 11-7.
After holding the Cougars scoreless in their half of the sixth, Saint Ambrose would score three runs in their half of the sixth to make the game a one run game at the score of 11-10.
Despite allowing this many runs in two innings, the Cougars still seemed to be in control heading into the bottom of the seventh, up by one run. After recording the first out though, things fell apart.
An error by shortstop Alec Barnhart allowed the tying run on base and a walk to one of the St. Ambrose batters put the game winning run on base. The next batter would hit a three run walk off home run for the Fighting Bees, completing the epic collapse of the Cougars.
The Cougars offense came to play in game one. Being led by left fielder Bryan Polak’s three hits and three RBIs in this game, the Cougars, as a team, would finish the game with a team batting average of .424.
Despite all this offense, the Cougars were done in by their lack of defense and pitching. The Cougars’ pitchers allowed a total of 13 runs, but only four of those runs were earned. That was due to the fact that the Cougars committed an absurd eight errors in the game.
Despite the loss, the Cougars would jump out to an early 3-0 lead in the first inning. Once again though, the Cougars would give up this lead. In the bottom of the third, Saint Ambrose would hit a three run homer to tie the game at 3-3.
After some more scoreless innings by both teams, St. Ambrose would take their first lead of the game in the bottom of the fifth inning when they scored two runs to take a 5-3 lead.
From there, the Fighting Bees would add another run to their lead, while holding off the Cougars for the rest of the way to complete the sweep of the Cougars and win the second game 6-3.
Unlike the first game, the Cougars did not have enough offense to overcome their opposition in this game. In this game, the Cougars could only muster six hits and a team average of .240.
After getting swept, the Cougars record fell to 9-25 with a conference record of 7-16. Due to games being postponed, the Cougars next game will be played on April 22, against Olivet Nazarene University.
John Romando
Senior Sports Editor
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