BUCKHANNON, W.Va. – The Concord University baseball team finished off a four-game sweep of West Virginia Wesleyan Sunday afternoon in Mountain East Conference action taking wins 6-1 and 12-3 at Hank Ellis Field.
Game 1: Concord 6 – West Virginia Wesleyan 1
Timely hitting and a masterful pitching performance from freshman utility
Eddie Blake led the Mountain Lions (8-16, 7-13 MEC) to a game one victory.
Concord scored a run in each of the first two innings as the leadoff man reached in each instance. Freshman infielder
Zack Saryeldin started the contest with a double before scoring two batters later on a base hit by junior infielder
Evan Antonellis. In the second, sophomore outfielder
Josh Adkins poked a single into right field before racing home on a single from junior catcher
Chance Davis.
Davis drove in another run in the fourth while Saryeldin was responsible for a second run in the frame on a sacrifice fly.
The four-run lead was more than enough for Blake who retired the first nine batters he faced, and got a double play in the fourth to erase a leadoff single.
Sophomore outfielder
Richard Ortiz led off the fifth inning with his sixth home run of the season to elevate the lead to 5-0. Adkins scored later in the inning on a two-out knock from junior outfielder
Brandon Bayne.
Blake cruised through the fifth and sixth innings, and got the first two outs of the seventh before the Bobcats (3-15, 3-15 MEC) strung together three straight hits to plate a run. However, Blake induced a ground ball to prevent further scoring, ending the game.
Blake (2-0) needed just 70 pitches to toss his first career complete game—in just his second start—as he allowed a run on four hits while striking out six.
Adkins, Davis, Saryeldin and junior infielder
Anthony Stehlin all had two hits with Davis knocking in two runs from the ninth spot in the lineup.
Game 2: Concord 12 – West Virginia Wesleyan 3
Concord opened up a 6-0 lead through three innings as it cruised to a game four win, and the series sweep of WVWC.
Saryeldin came around in the first inning after another leadoff hit, and a sacrifice fly from Stehlin.
The 1-0 edge stood up until the third when the Mountain Lions tallied five runs. The first four batters of the frame reached, starting with a triple from Davis. Saryeldin and Stehlin had run-scoring hits before freshman catcher
Nick Funk capped the rally with a two-run single to open up a 6-0 lead.
Back-to-back home runs from Wesleyan trimmed the Concord lead in half in the bottom of the third, but the Mountain Lions came back with three runs in both the fifth and sixth innings.
All three runs in the fifth came with two outs as Adkins sent a single into right field to score Ortiz while Davis continued to swing a hot bat with a two-run double. In the sixth, one swing of the bat got three runs CU in as Funk sent his first home run of the season over the left field fence to score freshman infielder
Michael Dupont and Ortiz.
The Mountain Lions used three pitchers to hold Wesleyan to five hits. Senior pitcher
Spencer Hoyt allowed three runs while striking out six in three innings. Junior pitcher
Dan Nicholls (1-4) pitched the middle innings as he recorded four strikeouts in three frames. Freshman pitcher
Eddy Castellanos pitched a scoreless seventh.
Funk was 3-for-4 with five RBI. Saryeldin had another three hits in the nightcap. Adkins and Davis were each 2-for-4 with three RBI between them. For the doubleheader, Saryeldin was 5-for-7. Adkins went 4-fo-7 and Davis tallied four RBI to go with a 4-for-7 showing.
The Mountain Lions return to Anderson Field to start an eight-game home stand 1:00 p.m. Saturday against Davis & Elkins.
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