Grantham, PA — After winning nine straight ballgames over the past two weeks, the Messiah College baseball team showed it could dominate.
Saturday afternoon, the club showed it could rebound.
Messiah (15-7, 2-1) handed Albright College a pair of defeats in a Saturday double-header, winning the first by a 5-4 score in extra innings while cruising past the Lions 8-2 in the nightcap.
The wins helped Messiah forget about its lone hiccup in its last 12 games, as Albright (7-9, 1-2) beat the Falcons by a 3-1 score in the first game of the MAC Commonwealth series Friday afternoon.
“It was really good to bounce back after a loss, and I thought the guys responded well,” said Bryan Engle, Messiah head coach. “It was great to get two out of three this weekend. Albright is a good team that will win games in the conference. Hopefully we'll be able to use this to gain some momentum as the conference season continues.”
Engle's club had to generate its own impetus to claim the first of Saturday's double-dip, as the Falcons watched a 4-0 lead fizzle away late. Messiah scored two runs in both the bottom of the second and fourth innings, while freshman and starting pitcher Travis Thome held the Lions scoreless through the first five innings of work.
A single from senior Kyle Stuckey drove Messiah's first two runs across the plate, while a fourth-inning triple from sophomore Sheldon Witmer knocked the team's third score in. Witmer himself then crossed the plate following a wild pitch, and Messiah possessed the 4-0 advantage.
While Thome was stellar through the first five innings of work — just five hits allowed with four strikeouts and no walks — fatigue began to set in at the start of the sixth. Albright landed its lead-off batter thanks to a Messiah error, while a walk and a pair of doubles brought home a total three scores.
Engle then inserted junior Kurt Heim to pitch, and the hard-throwing right hander forced a pair of groundouts to end the inning.
“Travis did such a solid job for us, it would have been nice to get him the (pitching) win,” Engle said. “I thought he deserved that. He started getting behind a bit in the sixth and the ball was getting up in the zone for the first time of the day.”
Following a four-up, three-down bottom of the sixth for Messiah, Albright tacked on the tying run in the top of the seventh, making use of a lead-off walk to knot the game at 4-4. A pair of singles scored the lead-off runner just two batters later, while Heim was able to retire the side in impressive fashion: Two strikeouts and a groundout concluded what may have been an even greater stanza for the Lions, as the visitors left two on base.
Engle's club then went three up, three down in the bottom of the seventh, forcing the scheduled seven-inning event to go longer. Heim teamed with senior Ben Jordan (2-0) to effectively end the top of the eighth inning, as Jordan entered the game with two runners on and two outs retired before forcing a ground out.
A clutch, two-out single from junior Ben Kirk would ultimately end the game in positive fashion for Messiah, as sophomore Jordan Zimmerman reached via walk and Ben Jordan via hit by pitch — both coming with two outs already gone. Kirk then came to the plate and pulled a 0-2 pitch to left-center field, bringing home Zimmerman in celebratory fashion.
“It was a great adjustment by Kirk to come up with the game's biggest hit,” Engle said. “He really shortened his swing and just focused on making contact, and it turned out to win the game for us.”
Stuckey was the squad's only multiple-hit performer on the game, going 2-3 with a run scored and two RBI. Kirk's eighth-inning blast was his lone hit of the contest, while Witmer finished 1-3 with a run scored and an RBI as well.
To that point, the home win was the second in walk-off variety in as many attempts, as Messiah used a bottom-of-the-ninth RBI single from Witmer to defeat Susquehanna University by a 4-3 score on Mar. 12.
Perhaps the only downer of Saturday's first game was the conclusion of sophomore Adam Ranck's 13-game hitting streak, as the third baseman went hitless in four at bats. His streak ended just a game shy of the school record, held by 2006 graduate Chris Heisey.
“Like we talked about yesterday to our team, conference games are always going to be close,” Engle said. “Even after we got out to a 4-0 lead, you just can't give teams an inch. Our relievers were solid enough to keep us there, and we needed a clutch play to get it done.”
Messiah rode a stellar, complete-game pitching performance from Witmer (3-0) to register the 8-2 decision in Saturday's second contest. In what appeared to be game that wasn't close, late inning heroics were needed to put the second game away as the Lions trimmed a 3-0 Messiah lead to 3-2, with two unearned runs in the visiting half of the sixth inning.
In the first inning, a double from sophomore Jon-Mike Richards drove in the Falcons' initial score, while a double from junior Jonny Ebersole knocked in two more in the fourth.
As Witmer held Albright scoreless through five complete innings, Engle's club erupted in the sixth, as singles from senior Craig Mease, Richards and Zimmerman all drove in runs.
That offense came at a needed moment, as a pair of Messiah errors helped the Lions to two scores in the top of the sixth.
“I really liked what Sheldon did on the mound today, and our defense was good until the sixth inning, but then the wheels kind of fell off,” Engle said. “We had two double-play balls that we didn't turn, and Albright brought it right back to a 3-2 game. We've talked so much about holding teams down after we score, but today the tables were turned. We wanted to score some runs after giving some up, and we were able to do that in the bottom of the sixth. That was really the first time in the series that we were able to really get the bats going.”
Richards finished 3-4 with two RBI thanks to a pair of doubles, while Mease and Ebersole each batted two in via 1-3 and 2-3 efforts, respectively. Jordan finished 3-4 in the DH role, while Ranck effectively began another hitting streak, notching a single in his first at-bat of the game.
Witmer finished with five strikeouts and just one walk in his complete game performance, giving up just six hits. Neither of Albright's two runs were earned.
Messiah will now take a brief hiatus from league play, as the team will host former MAC Commonwealth institution Juniata College in a single, nine-inning contest Wednesday. The Eagles come into the game at 12-6, including an 11-game winning streak. All signs point to a great game between two of the hottest teams in the region as the Falcons enter having won 11 of their last 12. First pitch is set for 3 p.m.
