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GameDay Preview
ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University baseball team had so much fun beating Augsburg in extra innings — twice — Sunday afternoon that the Cardinals decided to go the “extra mile” again Monday in the opening game of their Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference doubleheader against Macalester.
Less than 24 hours after posting back-to-back eight-inning victories over the Auggies — the first a 7-5 win and the second a 2-0 triumph — SMU put in a little more overtime against the Scots.
With the same result.
Kevin Gannon (Roselle, Ill.) delivered a one-out, RBI double to right in the bottom of the 10th inning, scoring pinch-runner
Matt Tessmer (Bloomington, Minn.) from second with the game-winning run, as SMU outlasted Macalester 2-1 at Midway Stadium.
Unfortunately, there would be no early, mid- or late-game heroics in the second game, as Macalester erupted for four runs in the top of the first inning and never looked back in earning the split with a 7-1 victory in Game 2.
A day after
Justin Kronebusch (Altura, Minn.) and
Tyler Krysiak (Bloomington, Minn.) combined on a five-hit shutout in SMU's 2-0, eight-inning Game 2 win over Augsburg Sunday,
Teddy VanRanst (St. Paul, Minn.) and
A.J. Redders (Middleton, Wis.) picked right up where their Cardinal teammates left off in the opener against the Scots.
VanRanst tossed five shutout innings, before a lead-off walk came back to haunt him in the sixth. Macalester's Brady Bronfenbrenner opened the inning with a walk and scored the game's first run on a one-out RBI groundout by Jimmy Belfont.
As good as VanRanst was, Macalester's Nathan Kelleher-Crew was equally as impressive, matching VanRanst zero for zero through the first five innings, before adding another zero in the sixth, as Macalester took a 1-0 advantage into what appeared to be the Cardinals' final at-bat.
SMU, however, had other ideas.
Willie Doll (Amherst, Wis.) led off the inning by launching his team-leading third home run of the season —just the third hit the Cardinals had mustered off Kelleher-Crew to that point — to tie the game at 1-1.
And force extra innings — again.
After failing to score in the ninth, despite having runners on first and second with one out — and then escaping a one-out triple by Macalester's David Melms in the top of the 10th — the Cardinals got another shot in the bottom of the inning.
And this time Gannon delivered.
After a lead-off groundout by
Mike Feriancek (River Falls, Wis.),
Taylor Thelemann (Bloomington, Minn.) and
Paul LaNasa (Mahtomedi, Minn.) delivered back-to-back singles — and Gannon followed with his walk-off RBI double to right field, pushing SMU's winning streak to four straight, and the Cardinals' extra-inning winning streak to 12.
Doll highlighted SMU's eight-hit attack, going 3-for-4 with that clutch seventh-inning home run, while LaNasa added two hits in five at-bats. Redders earned the pitching win in relief of VanRanst, tossing four innings of two-hit, shutout ball. He did not walk a batter and struck out six. VanRanst went the first six innings, giving up just that solo run in the sixth on three hits, while walking two and striking out five.
Macalester didn't waste any time putting Game 2 out of reach, as the Scots scored four runs on five hits off SMU starter
Ben Johnson (Brooklyn Park, Minn.) in their first at-bat to grab a quick 4-0 advantage.
And while the Scots' offense got out of the gates quickly and never took their foot off the gas, the Cardinals could got shifted out of neutral until it was too late.
Macalester pitcher Chase Kahn limited SMU to just two hits — a
Zach Wolfe (Wabasha, Minn.) double in the second, and a third-inning single by
Kyle Servais (Westby, Wis.) — before SMU got to the junior left-hander for a run and three hits in the bottom of the seventh inning.
Feriancek and
Matt Tessmer (West St. Paul, Minn.) delivered back-to-back one-out singles in the seventh — Tessmer's driving in Thelemann, who had reached on an error — and LaNasa followed with a single to load the bases.
That, however, would be the extent of the Cardinals' rally, as Kahn got Gannon to strike out to end the threat — and the game.
The Cardinals (8-8 MIAC, 17-14 overall) are back in action on Wednesday, traveling to Northfield, Minn., for a 1 p.m. conference doubleheader against Carleton. SMU then closes out regular-season play on Thursday, heading to Moorhead, Minn., to take on Concordia in a 2 p.m. MIAC twinbill.