DAVENPORT, Fla. — The Saint Mary's University baseball team broke out the heavy artillery Wednesday afternoon in its nine-inning nonconference game against the University of Dubuque.
The Cardinals banged out 10 hits against the Spartans — including their first home run of the season, a two-run blast by
Daniel Marxen (Maple Grove, Minn.).
Problem was, the Spartans also unveiled some rather heavy artillery of their own, launching their first home run of the young season — and their second.
And with two swings of the bat, the University of Dubuque had plated seven runs and went on to deal Saint Mary's a 10-7 setback at NorthEast Regional Park.
"We're making progress, but we still have to clean up the mistakes a bit," said Saint Mary's coach
Nick Winecke. "I thought we did some good things today — we swung the bats very well — but we still have a lot of work to do."
The Cardinals came out swinging, scoring the game's first four runs in the third inning — two on a
Jack Arndt (Coon Rapids, Minn.) single and the other two on Marxen's first collegiate home run.
The Dubuque got one back in the fourth, scoring an unearned run off Saint Mary's starter
Jake Mercado (Belle Plaine, Minn.).
That would be the only run the Spartans would get off Mercado, who allowed three runs on three hits over six innings, before giving way to reliever
Justin Haugo (Springfield, Minn.) with two on and one out in the seventh.
And the Spartans were not kind to the Cardinal senior.
Parker Allen made it 4-2 with a sacrifice fly to center, and, after a ground-out and a walk, Hunter Martindale launched a three-run bomb to give the Spartans their first lead of the game, 5-4.
The Spartans' lead quickly ballooned to six, 10-4, in the eighth, when Jake Celkander was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to score one, and Mitch Pomeroy followed with a pinch-hit, grand slam home run.
Saint Mary's threatened in their final at-bat, loading the bases on back-to-back-to-back singles by Marxen,
Ben Coons (Kimberly, Wis.), and
Jared Mitchell. One out later,
Brandon Merfeld (La Crosse, Wis.) drew a bases-loaded walk and
Trevon VanEgtern (La Crosse, Wis.) followed with an RBI groundout to make it 10-6. A Spartan throwing error plated SMU's third run of the inning, but UD reliever Noah Zoglman induced Arndt to fly out to center to end the threat.
Marxen led the way for the Cardinals, going 3-for-5 with a pair of RBIs and two runs scored, while Coons chipped in two hits in five at-bats. VanEgtern, Arndt, Mitchell, Merfeld, and
Cameron Weber accounted for SMU's other five hits.
The Cardinals (2-2 overall) are right back in action on Thursday, squaring off against Rose-Hulman in a nine-inning nonconference game in Auburndale, Fla. Opening pitch is slated for 11 a.m. EST.
