The Beloit College baseball team split a pair of games against Midwest Conference North Division leader Chicago blanking the Maroons 19-0 in a shortened seven-inning affair before falling in the nightcap 6-4. Despite the split, the Buccaneers'' league tournament hopes are still alive as it continues to be a four-team race for the top two spots in the north.
The division is still up in the air with Sunday's games to determine who gets in to the conference tournament. St. Norbert has wrapped up the conference slate boasting a 10-6 record to hold second. With the split, the University of Chicago maintains the top spot at 9-5. Ripon split with Lawrence Saturday to move to 8-6 in MWC play with the final two games of their series against the Vikings set for Sunday. Beloit is fourth with a 7-7 record with their final two games at Chicago Sunday.
In Saturday's opener, the Bucs' offense exploded in the bottom of the third inning capitalizing on hit batters, walks and errors with timely hits to put up 13 runs in the frame. The scores came in the following fashion: Garrison Ferone's RBI double to left center, a two-RBI double to right center off the bat of James Wicker, a fielder's choice with a throwing error that allowed two runners to score, A Drew Freitag single to left field that plated one more, a double off the bat of Mitch Campbell for an RBI, Nick Schmidt's sacrifice fly to center field, an Ethan Conley single to left center that plated one, another Wicker hit for an RBI, a dropped line drive that had two Buccaneers cross home, and Cole Hofmann's slow roller to the pitcher that had no one covering first base allowing another Buc to come in.
After all of that, the Bucs continued to roll adding a single run in the bottom of the fourth before putting up a five-spot in the sixth for the 19-0, seven-inning win.
Jalen Davis was 3-for-4 at the plate with three runs scored and an RBI while four more Buc hitters registered multiple hits in the game.
Danny Belling continued to be lights out on the mound scattering seven hits over seven innings while striking out three for another complete game win. He is now 5-1 on the season.
Game two was a different story as the Buc bats cooled off. Despite recording 12 hits in the game, Beloit was only able to push four runners across.
Conley gave the Bucs the lead with a single through the left side that plated Schmidt. Chicago knotted the game in the fifth and then claimed the lead in the sixth before extending the margin to four, 5-1, in the seventh. An insurance run came in in the top of the eighth to make it 6-2 but the Bucs didn't go quietly.
Down to their final three outs, Beloit put the pressure on. Schmidt notched a one-out single to right center and moved to second on Ferone's bunt. With two outs, Davis singled to left center to score Schmidt. Conley followed with a single through the left side and Wicker made it three straight two out hits for Beloit to bring in Davis and make it 6-4 with two runners on. The Maroons opted to go to second base on a fielder's choice in the next at bat and Wicker nearly beat out the toss but the umpire signaled out to end the game.
Beloit left 11 runners on base in the game. Davis and Conley each registered three hits in the game combining for three RBI and one run scored.
Justin Kopech suffered the loss in 6.2 innings of work to fall to 1-2 on the season.
Beloit will head to Chicago to wrap up the regular season with a pair of games against the Maroons Sunday.
