Tiger baseball takes two from Midland
MITCHELL, S.D. – The Dakota Wesleyan University baseball team gained valuable footing in the Great Plains Athletic Conference race with a sweep of Midland University Tuesday afternoon. The Tigers won 5-1 and 8-7 on a walk off RBI sac fly in a pair of games at Cadwell Park in Mitchell.
MITCHELL, S.D. – The Dakota Wesleyan University baseball team gained valuable footing in the Great Plains Athletic Conference race with a sweep of Midland University Tuesday afternoon. The Tigers won 5-1 and 8-7 on a walk off RBI sac fly in a pair of games at Cadwell Park in Mitchell.
The Tigers improved to 17-27 overall and 6-6 in the league – good for a tie for fourth – with the two wins. Doane leads the league with a 10-2 record and Morningside and Nebraska Wesleyan are both 9-3. Concordia University is also 6-6.
The Tigers entered the final inning of the second game needing a hit from everyone, and the bats came through for Dakota Wesleyan. The Tigers led Midland early, and went up 2-0 in the first on a two-run homer by Erik Nockleby. The Warriors took a 4-2 lead in the second on a two-run double, an RBI double and an RBI single. DWU scored a single run in the third on an RBI groundout by Michael Lukkason, but Midland made it a 6-3 game thanks to a two-run single in the top of the fifth inning.
The Tigers left two runners stranded in the sixth, and Midland made it a four-run game in the seventh on an RBI sac fly, but left two more runners stranded. Nockleby and Stephen Gunnell singled to start the bottom of the inning and Nick Tadlock hit a three-run homer to make it a 7-6 game. Chris Ciatti tied the game in the next at-bat with a solo home run to keep DWU alive. Lukkason singled, and Nick Meyer came in to run. Alex Hinz grounded out, but Meyer advanced to second. Toby Kaplan walked to put runners at first and second, and Maximum Shower flied out to center field, but Meyer came around to score to end the game.
Tadlock went 3-for-3 with three RBIs to pace DWU, which had 10 total hits. Lukkason added two hits and Nockleby and Gunnell each went 2-for-4. Joey Fitzgerald threw the first four innings and gave up six runs on five hits with three strikeouts. Chris Housley threw two-thirds of an inning, and Ethan Opsahl came in to pitch the final 2.1 innings. He gave up a single run on four hits and struck out three batters.
In the first game, DWU got on the board first when Jon Holsworth scored on a wild pitch in the third inning. Midland tied the game in the fourth on an RBI single, but Tadlock had an RBI single to score Nockleby and put the Tigers up 2-1 in the bottom of the inning. DWU scored all the runs it would need in the fifth on a two-run single by Nockleby and an RBI single by Kirk McBreen. The Tigers took advantage of two Midland errors that inning.
Nockleby had two hits and two RBIs to pace the Tigers in the first game. DWU had seven total hits. Nick Pecha threw all seven innings and gave up a single earned run on seven hits with five strikeouts.
Dakota Wesleyan is back in action Thursday, April 19, when it hosts Dakota State University in a nonconference doubleheader at 1 p.m. in Mitchell. The Tigers are also at home Saturday at 1 p.m. against Doane and Sunday at 4 p.m. against Hastings.