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WINONA, Minn. — Just call them “The Cardiac Cardinals.”
For the second straight game, the Saint Mary's University baseball team found themselves staring at a seemingly insurmountable seventh-inning deficit, and for the second straight game, the Cardinals almost pulled out the victory.
Almost.
Again.
Just a week after scoring six runs in the top of the seventh inning — and leaving the tying run stranded at second base — in a 13-12 loss to Augsburg, the Cardinals were at it again in Game 1 against Macalester Saturday. Trailing 8-2 in the bottom of the seventh of the opener, SMU erupted for five runs — including a clutch, two-strike, two-run single by
Chris Bogie (St. Paul, Minn.) — only to once again leave the tying run stranded at second in an 8-7 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference loss at Winona State's Loughery Field.
SMU set itself up for another seventh-inning rally in Game 2, trailing by four heading into their final at-bat. This time around, however, the Cardinals weren't able to muster a comeback, falling to the Scots, 12-8.
“(Macalester was) just a little better than we were today,” said a disappointed SMU coach
Nick Whaley, whose team fell to 0-4 in the MIAC and 3-10 overall. “We did not play all that well.
“You can't keep putting yourself in deep holes like we have been,” added Whaley. “It was good to see us mount that (Game 1) comeback, but you aren't going to win many games when you need to score five or six runs in the seventh inning to do it.”
Heading into Saturday's twinbill, it appeared like the Cardinals would feast on Scot pitching, after all, in their first two MIAC games, SMU plated 14 runs against Augsburg, while Macalester surrendered 33 runs in its first two conference contests.
As it turned out, there was a feast all right — and Cardinal was the main course.
Macalester, which was coming off 9-2 and 24-5 losses to St. Thomas on Friday, got a second-inning grand slam from Devin English in the opener, built its lead to 8-2 and rode the two-hit pitching of James Murray, before SMU's bats came to life in the seventh, scoring five runs on four hits.
The offensive fireworks continued in the second game, as the Cardinals loaded the bases with no one out and scored twice in the third, then both teams erupted for five runs in the fifth inning — SMU's highlighted by
Kevin Black's
(Mahtomedi, Minn.) two-run triple — before Macalester erased SMU's 7-5 lead with six runs in the top of the fifth.
SMU cut the gap to 11-8 on a two-out Black RBI single in the bottom of the fifth, but Macalester answered with a run in the sixth to seal the win.
“It's disappointing,” said Whaley. “Offensively, we are doing a pretty good job, and I thought we played OK defensively. We're just give up too many runs — plain and simple.”
