Box Score 1 |
Box Score 2 HUNTINGTON, Ind. — The Goshen College baseball team got hits from six different players in the second game of a doubleheader Saturday as the Maple Leafs posted a 3-2 win to claim a Crossroads League series win from Huntington University at Forest Glen Park. The Foresters emerged victorious in the first game by a 3-0 count.
The Maple Leafs (21-25, 12-15) got run-scoring hits from Colby Malson and Cody McCoy while Baylee Young pitched 5 2/3 innings of baseball for the win in the nightcap. McCoy's bases-loaded ground ball drove in an insurance run in the sixth inning to tack on an insurance run.
Huntington (18-20, 16-8) got one of the runs back in the bottom of the sixth when Jake Hansen was hit with a pitch with the bases loaded. After a bases-loaded sacrifice fly from Adam Roser closed the deficit to 3-2 with two outs in the ninth, Goshen closer Colby Malson got catcher Hunter Losekamp to fly out to center, closing out his 10th save of the season.
Maple Leaf catcher Clinton Stroble II recorded the only double of the game in the fourth inning to set up the first run: no player on either side had multiple hits, although GC's Brad Stoltzfus and a pair of Foresters each had both a hit and a walk.
Huntington did all of its scoring in the fourth inning of the opener despite Roser starting the inning with a ground ball to the pitcher. A hit batter and two singles would set up a sacrifice fly from Jake Hansen one batter before Tyler Zimske added a two-run single.
Braedon Evans held the Foresters to one hit outside of that inning, however, striking out four in five innings of work. Kyle Staelgrave struck out two and picked off one in an inning of relief.
The top third of Goshen's offense mustered four hits and a walk while the bottom six spots went hitless against HU starter Connor West, who fired a complete game. The Maple Leafs got two hits in both the first and sixth innings, bringing the tying run to the plate with no outs in the latter before making three straight outs.
Stoltzfus' 2-for-3 performance made him the only batter on either side with multiple hits: all eight hits in the game were singles. Ben Longacre's sixth-inning single made him the 10th Maple Leaf (and second Longacre, joining 1995 graduate Kyle) with 60 hits in a season.
The close of the doubleheader also marked the end of Goshen's 58th Crossroads League regular-season campaign, with the Maple Leafs matching their sixth-place finish of a year ago and improving their record by a game to 12-15. GC will open the Crossroads League tournament at Taylor University at 10 a.m. Friday morning against Huntington; the full tournament bracket will be released later this week.
While the Crossroads League schedule wraps up Monday and Tuesday with several makeup games, Goshen visits Chicagoland on Monday for a doubleheader against Trinity Christian College. First pitch is set for 2 p.m. EDT.