Baseball uses comeback to get win vs. Akron
The CMU baseball team opened up a weekend series against the Akron Zips on Friday with a 10-6 win.
The Chippewas (16-11, 6-1 Mid-American Conference) scored runs in five out of the last six innings to pick up the victory.
Senior infielder Ricky Clark dropped in a bloop single to right that scored two runs, giving the Chippewas an 8-6 lead that it would hold on to.
“We got a good break. We thought we were one hit away from getting back into the game, then we got that break,” said coach Steve Jaksa. “They (Akron) did not make a lot of mistakes, but they made that mistake. There was a lot of wind and I thought our guys hustled pretty good.”
Sophomore closer Trent Howard picked up his second win of the season after coming in relief for starting pitcher senior Jesse Hernandez.
Hernandez pitched 6 1/3 innings and allowed three earned runs while striking out seven batters. He threw 116 pitches, 80 of which were strikes.
Howard closed out the final 2 and 2/3 innings and had four strikeouts en route to the victory.
The Chippewas were down 3-0 in the first inning and were down 5-1 going into the fifth inning before mounting a comeback.
“There is always going to be games where you have to come back. One of our guys said in the dugout that we need to play all nine innings,” Jaksa said. “We played all nine innings. I think as your team matures, your team starts to understand that you have to play all nine innings.”
Senior catcher Dale Cornstubble had four hits and a run scored and a run batted in. Senior third baseman James Teas also collected three hits with two runs scored and an RBI.
The Chippewas will go for their second win in a row at 2 p.m. Saturday at Theunissen Stadium, sophomore Rick Dodridge will get the start as the team looks to win its third MAC series of the season.
