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Box Score 2 LOUDONVILLE, N.Y. — Siena scored two runs in the bottom of the ninth Saturday to take a win over ACU in the second game of a non-conference doubleheader, sweeping the twinbill from the Wildcats at Siena Field.
The 5-0 and 3-2 losses drop ACU to 19-22 on the season, while the Saints improve to 12-28 with the two wins. ACU will be back in action Tuesday night when it hosts TCU in a game at Crutcher Scott Field set to start at 6:30 p.m. The Wildcats will then host Central Arkansas in a three-game Southland Conference series (Friday-Sunday) as they try to get back into the race for one of the eight spots in the conference postseason tournament.
The Wildcats managed to scratch out just six hits in the two games Saturday and only scored in one of 18 innings, plating two runs in the third inning of the second game of the twinbill. Here's a recap of each game of the doubleheader:
Game One (Siena 5, ACU 0) — The Wildcats managed just two hits off Siena pitchers Tommy Miller and Tom Sutera as the Saints recorded their fourth shutout of the season and picked up their 11th win of the 2018 season. ACU's only hits in the game were a second-inning single by
Colton Eager and a fourth-inning drag bunt single by
Derek Scott.
Siena got the only run it would need in the first inning when leadoff hitter Marcos Campos singled, went to second on a groundout, moved to third on a fly ball out to center field and scored on a single by Brian Kelly. The Saints tacked on three more runs in the fifth with the final two coming home on a two-out, two-strike, two-run single to right field by Nico Ramos. Siena scored its final run in the seventh on an RBI groundout by Zach Durfee.
Miller picked up the win to improve to 5-6 on the season as he went seven shutout innings, allowing just the two hits and one walk while striking out five Wildcats. Sutera pitched two perfect innings to close it out.
Jonathan Nicholson started on the mound for the Wildcats and went five innings, allowing 11 hits and four runs while striking out five Saints. He was tagged with the loss to fall to 2-6 on the season.
Game Two (Siena 3, ACU 2) — ACU scored two unearned runs in the third inning when Matt Munoz scored on a throwing error by Siena second baseman Jordan Bishop, and then
Caleb Kyle came home on a squeeze bunt by
Koby Claborn. That would be all of the offense the rest of the day for the Wildcats, who were absolutely shut down by the quartet of Brendan White, Ryan Bellomo, Matt Pierce and Avery Short.
At one point those four Siena pitchers retired 14 straight Wildcats and in the last four innings of the game the Wildcats managed just two baserunners. Siena needed just 89 pitches in the second game to get through nine innings.
ACU's pitching was just as solid as starter
Brock Barger allowed just six hits and one run in 5 2/3 innings of works. Reliever
Brennan Lewis was solid as well as he got out of a jam in the sixth, worked around a leadoff double in the seventh and set the Saints down with ease in the eighth to take a 2-1 lead to the bottom of the ninth.
But Jonathan Crimmin pulled a 2-2 pitch into left field for a leadoff single and went to second when Dan Lowndes punched an 0-2 pitch into right field for a double to put runners at second and third with no outs. After intentionally walking Matt Hamel to load the bases, Lewis struck out the No. 9 man in the lineup, Josh DelSignore, for the first out.
But the first pitch Lewis threw to leadoff hitter Marcos Campos was pulled into the left-centerfield, and that single plated both Crimmin and pinch-runner Zach Durfee with the tying and winning runs.
