Winning tournament opener is a grind for W&J
Falling into the losers bracket on the first day of the Presidents’ Athletic Conference baseball tournament has not always been fatal to teams, but winning that first game can sure make the upcoming days easier for your pitching staff, especially this year because the tournament has expanded from four to six teams.
Washington & Jefferson’s Drew Garth spared the guys in W&J’s bullpen a potential heavy workload with one swing of his bat Wednesday.
Garth drove a pitch the opposite way, deep to left centerfield, with one out in the bottom of the ninth inning to score pinch-runner Eli Kite from second base with the game-winning run as top-seeded W&J defeated Thiel 6-5 in the opening contest of the PAC tournament at Ross Memorial Park.
The win sends W&J (29-12) into a 2:30 p.m. game today againstWaynesburg (23-18), which lost to Allegheny late Wednesday.
“The big advantage of winning this game is you get to face the loser of a game. Plus, to win the tournament you don’t have to win four games in a span of about 48 hours,” W&J coach Jeff Mountain said. “Winning this one spreads it out. It’s less of a grind to win it.”
The game against sixth-seeded Thiel (15-23) was exactly that – a grind. Both teams scored twice in the fourth inning and W&J pushed ahead 3-2 in the fifth. Thiel tied it in the sixth and W&J went back on top, 5-3, in the seventh.
But Thiel, showing more fight than could be expected from a sub-.500 team playing on the road, scored single runs in the eighth and ninth innings to tie the score again, at 5-5.
That set the stage for the bottom of the ninth, which began with Thiel starter Alec Katon plunking pinch-hitter Brian Feldman. It was the final pitch for Katon, who scattered eight hits. He walked one, struck out one, pitched to contact and consistently worked from ahead in the count. He kept the Tomcats in the game.
“He has been our one steady guy we can count on,” said Thiel coach Joe Schaly. “He’s had some bad-luck games where he would give up one or two earned runs and not get a win. He was really good down the stretch of the season.”
Kite replaced Feldman on first base and was advanced to second base on Ben Schuler’s second sacrifice bunt of the game. Thiel then opted not to intentionally walk W&J’s Jacob LaDuca, who had multiple walk-off hits in last year’s tournament, which would have set up a potential double play. Instead, LaDuca hit a roller to shortstop Cole Sherwin, whose throw to first base was low but caught by Yoshinori Hashimoto, who had entered the game in the ninth.
Mountain argued that the throw had pulled Hashimoto off the bag, and after the three umpires discussed the play, the call was overturned and LaDuca was ruled safe.
Garth then hit a pitch from Thiel reliever Ethan Bintrim deep into the gap in left centerfield, for what was scored a long single, as Fike raced home the winning run.
“Nothing comes easy,” Mountain said. “We’re a young team. We had six starters who were starting their first PAC tournament game.”
One of those was Garth, who is a transfer from Seton Hill.
“We don’t actively seek transfers, but we had coaches from Seton Hill calling us and speaking on his behalf. They said he’s a good kid. His freshman year at Seton Hill, he had a good run and then the sophomore year didn’t go as well for him.”
Garth also hit an RBI double that gave W&J a 3-2 lead in the fifth.
Ethan Boring, the third W&J pitcher, was the winner with two innings of relief.
Thiel will have to bounce back today (11 a.m.) against Westminster in an elimination game.
“Winning that first game is more important than ever this year because the tournament has expanded to six teams,” Schaly said. “We don’t have a pitcher like Katon waiting, so we’re going to have to win with our hitting.”
Thiel catcher Nathan Prunty went 3-for-5 and Aidan Ochs, the No. 9 hitter in the lineup, had a pair of RBI singles.