MOUNTAINEER BASEBALL

Story by Aric Thomas
(03-23-08)

Eastern Wins 6th and 7th Straight

On Saturday the Eastern Oklahoma State College baseball team, ranked 18th by the NJCAA, improved to (22-7) by taking two games from Redlands Community College.  Redlands is currently ranked the 11th best Division II team in the country.  In game one, the Mountaineers won in extra innings 2-1.  Game two Eastern defeated the Cougars 6-3.

In the first game, Eastern plated their first run in the 2nd inning.  Nate Pettus led off with a double.  After Dearth Parker’s sacrifice bunt moved Pettus to 3rd base, Casey McCollum hit a sacrifice fly ball to left field.  It looked like the Mountaineers would win 1-0 behind a strong pitching performance by Ashton Mowdy.  Mowdy threw 6 innings, allowed no runs, two hits and struck out five.  He faced just 19 batters in six innings of work.  However, in the top of the 7th inning Redlands tied the game on three walks and a hit batsman.  Nate Pettus blew his first save of the season, but worked out of a bases loaded jam to keep the score tied.  After Pettus threw a scoreless 8th inning, Seth Terry tossed a scoreless 9th and picked up his third win of the year.  In the bottom of the 9th inning, McCollum hit a one out single.  After a walk to Brady White and Seth Terry striking out, Steve Irvine hit a walk off single to right center field.  It was the second walk off at bat for Irvine this week.

In game two the Mountaineers struck quick.  In the bottom of the 1st inning, singles by Jeff Scardino, Casey Gibson, Nate Pettus and Dearth Parker plated two runs.  Danny Cartwright hit his first career home run in the 2nd inning.  A two out Parker walk followed by a Casey McCollum double plated another run for Eastern in the 3rd inning.  Blake Mounce blasted his third home run of the season in the 4th inning and Parker hit his 3rd home run of the year in the 5th inning.  On the mound, Gunner Glad picked up his third win of the year in five innings of work.  He held the Cougars to just one run on three hits.  Glad also struck out four.  Phillip Parcell finished the game on the mound by tossing the 6th and 7th innings.  He allowed two runs on two hits and struck out two.

The Mountaineers will play at home again Tuesday (March 25th).  They will host Carl Albert State College in a single game beginning at 2:00 pm.