West Lawn, PA — Things on the Messiah College baseball team's "to do" list for Saturday:
• Win the 2008 MAC Commonwealth Championship.
• Give head coach Bryan Engle an ulcer.
The Falcons certainly accomplished the former — and possibly the latter — knocking out Elizabethtown College 7-3 in a winner-take-all, MAC Commonwealth Championship game Saturday afternoon. After winning its first two games in the double-elimination tournament (which included a 15-4 thumping of E'Town Friday evening), Messiah (27-16) had two opportunities to win one game over the Blue Jays Saturday.
It needed both.
Elizabethtown (26-12) handed Engle's club a 2-0 loss in Saturday's first game, setting up the true final contest Saturday afternoon. Behind a stellar pitching performance from senior Jeremy Stoltzfus and timely hitting from a slew of players, Engle's club came out on top in the rubber match, earning Messiah just its third MAC Commonwealth title in program history.
For the first-year skipper Engle, it was a bit dramatic.
“I was calm on the outside,” Engle said following Saturday's five hours and 20 minutes of baseball. “On the inside, things may have been different.”
Drama was not in the script for the majority of the Falcons' tournament run, as Messiah dealt Albright College a 3-0 defeat Thursday night before blasting past E'Town in Friday's 15-4 shocker. The Blue Jays then turned around and knocked off Widener University in Friday's nightcap, setting up a Saturday showdown with Messiah.
“We stuck around and watched some of E'Town's game against Widener (Friday night) before we came back to the hotel to make sure we were off our feet and to get some rest,” Engle said. “At our team meeting that night, when I told our players that E'Town had won, I think there was a definite sense of excitement. They wanted to win the championship by going through the team that had won the previous two. That's what you want, you don't want to back into a championship. You want to face the best team, and it makes it even more fun when that team is your rivals.”
By numbers, E'Town was just that, entering as the top seed after posting a regular-season league mark of 10-2, the best in the Commonwealth. The Blue Jays had also swept Messiah in the regular season, winning a 12-4 decision Apr. 18 and capturing 11-7 and 3-1 wins 24 hours later.
Needing just one win Saturday, Engle elected to throw freshman Travis Thome in the first game, and the first-year right hander was brilliant: Thome (4-3) struck out five and allowed just five hits in eight full innings of work, paving the way for another Messiah slugfest.
The problem: It never happened.
E'Town held Messiah down to just four hits, eventually taking the 2-0 decision behind a double and ensuing home run in the second inning. The Falcons recorded two doubles — sophomore Jordan Zimmerman and senior Kyle Stuckey provided them — stranding its only runners in scoring position in the third and fourth innings.
“Credit their pitcher, he threw a heck of a ball game,” Engle said. “When playing from behind, we had hoped to get things going offensively, but we just never did. And, when we did get hits, they came with two outs and nobody on base.
“For us, Travis was great,” Engle continued. “We always tell our pitchers, we don't expect you to win the game for us, we just expect you to keep us in it. Travis certainly did that in today's first game.”
Nevertheless, Messiah's golden opportunity coming into the day had lost some of its apparent shine: Elizabethtown had just handed Engle's club its first shut-out loss of the season, while the Falcons had to watch the Blue Jays celebrate extensively after forcing the grand finale.
For Engle, it was another cause for the 'one game at a time' speech.
“The momentum may have been in E'Town's favor, sure, but it wasn't if our guys really bought in to our year-long philosophy of one game at a time,” Engle said. “Whether we had won nine in a row or lost five in a row, that was our mindset. The next game was all that mattered. So really, Saturday's final game wasn't different for us at all.”
The play of Engle's club would affirm that sentiment.
Stoltzfus (4-4) was an absolute rock on the mound, going the full nine innings while allowing just eight E'Town hits, striking out two and walking just three. Messiah exhaled deeply after the second inning, where four singles and an RBI groundout plated four, giving Stoltzfus the type of cushion necessary to be aggressive. Senior Craig Mease belted a lead-off double in the fifth inning, eventually being driven home via a single from Zimmerman.
Messiah possessed a 5-0 lead heading into the bottom of the fifth inning, and thoughts of the day's 2-0 loss were a distant memory.
“Getting up early on a team is always a good thing, and we had guys step up today,” Engle said. “Our approaches at the plate were good, and we found gaps. In our regular-season games with E'Town, we hit the ball hard, but we just hit right at people. Today it was different.”
E'Town scored its first run in the bottom of the fifth, courtesy of another home run. Messiah then loaded the bases in the seventh but could only bring one run home — a single from junior Ben Kirk plated Mease, who opened the stanza with a walk — making it a 6-1 game.
E'Town added one in the eighth off a double and RBI single, but the Falcons made it a 7-2 game in the top of the ninth off two Blue Jay errors. The designated home team then pushed across another run with two outs retired in the bottom of the ninth, but Stoltzfus forced a fly out to end the game, setting off a club-wide celebratory dash to the pitcher's mound.
“As a coach, or maybe just as a first-year head coach, you don't relax until it's over,” Engle said, smiling. “As soon as J-Z (Zimmerman) called off our left fielder on that last fly ball, I finally breathed. It was a great finish to a great weekend.”
Mease again led the way for the team, going 2-4 with two runs scored and an RBI, being named the tournament MVP as a result. Kirk finished 2-5 with a run scored and an RBI, while sophomore Jon Shenk was 2-4 with a run scored and batted in.
Mease finished the tournament going 9-17 (.529) at the plate, blasting two home runs and three doubles. He also broke several Messiah program records with his weekend's efforts, becoming the new leader in home runs (10), RBI (50), runs scored (52), hits (66), extra-base hits (31), walks (39) and total bases (121). He also is currently tied for most doubles with 17.
Messiah will now wait until May 12 to find out its destination and opponent for NCAA Regional play. It will be the program's first appearance in regional competition since the 2005 season.
The team also stands just one victory away from equaling the program record for wins in a season, while Engle could not avoid a Gatorade bath at the conclusion of Saturday's win.
“I'm just happy for our guys,” Engle said. “They've worked so hard for a new coaching staff and tried to do what we've asked all season. I think we're all excited for what's to come in the next several weeks. We'll continue to take the one game at a time approach, and hopefully we can keep playing.”
Updates to Messiah's regional information will be made to this site as they become known.
