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Ninth Inning Rally
By John Antonik for MSNsportsNET.com
March 19, 2003
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MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Maybe West Virginia should just skip the first eight innings and go right to the ninth.
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Grant Psomas singled in two runs to lead West Virginia to an 8-7 come-from-behind win over St. Bonaventure Wednesday. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
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For the second time in a span of three games, West Virginia (10-6) came back to win a baseball game in dramatic fashion in the bottom of the ninth. Trailing St. Bonaventure 7-3, WVU rallied for five runs to defeat the Bonnies 8-7 and run its modest win streak to three games.
“Anytime you play St. Bonaventure it’s going to be tough,” said West Virginia coach Greg Van Zant. “They just play so hard, they’re smart, they stole a couple of runs off us and their pitcher pitched a really good game.”
Until the ninth, West Virginia batters had a difficult time adjusting to the 20 mph-plus winds blowing at Hawley Field Wednesday afternoon.
“It was a really tough day and the wind was blowing straight in and that kind of took us a little out of our game,” said Van Zant. “I told them we’ve really got to work on getting on top of the ball because we’re not going to hit the ball out of the ballpark today.”
On the other hand, St. Bonaventure (6-6) kept the ball on the ground, manufacturing four runs in the fourth, two in the sixth, and a single run in the seventh.
In St. Bonaventure’s four-run fourth, the Bonnies got three ground-ball singles through West Virginia’s infield to plate runs. The big hit was Matt Agostonelli’s two-run single through the right side, scoring Kevin Ryan and Josh Paine.
West Virginia answered with three runs in the bottom of the fourth. Tim McCabe led off the inning with a sharp double down the leftfield line. Derek Cisar moved McCabe to third with a single and took second on St. Bonaventure’s relay to the plate. Kurtis Clinton laced a double to straight away center field that was knocked down by the wind, scoring McCabe. Cisar scored on Pozluszny’s ground out to second and Clinton came around on Psomas’ single to center.
Trailing 7-3 in the bottom of the ninth, St. Bonaventure pitcher Soren Johnson, relieving starter Matt Gunesch, got Jake Serfass to pop out to short for the first out. Then three straight singles by Eric Grimm, Lee Fritz and McCabe loaded the bases for Clinton.
Once again Clinton came through, lacing a two-run double in the left center field gap, plating McCabe and Fritz to make the score 7-6, St. Bonaventure.
The Bonnies intentionally walked Posluszny to load the bases before Psomas took a Johnson fastball and drove it over leftfielder Dan Brayts’ head for the game-winning hit.
“We just have a lot of confidence right now and we never give up,” said Psomas. “It isn’t over with us until the last out.”
“Our guys kept plugging away and fortunately we strung together some base hits and got some key at-bats there in the last inning,” said Van Zant.
Todd Dunham, who pitched 2.2 scoreless innings in relief of starter Zac Cline, was credited with his first win of the season.
“Todd has shown that he can come out of the bullpen and go one time through the order pretty effectively,” said Van Zant. “Sometimes he finesses a little too much and tries to keep them from hitting the ball instead of making them hit it. I told him to go after the hitters and quit nibbling and he went out in the eighth and ninth innings and did a real nice job.”
Cline wasn’t his sharpest, allowing seven earned runs on 10 hits in 6.1 innings. The lefthander did strike out seven, though.
Johnson allowed five runs on five hits in 2.1 innings of relief to drop to 0-2 on the season. Starter Matt Gunesch allowed three runs on 10 hits through six innings.
West Virginia bats pounded out 15 hits. Fritz led the way with three hits in five at-bats, moving his average up to .481. Grimm, McCabe, Cisar, Clinton and Psomas each had two hits. Clinton drove in three runs.
“We’re capable of putting up four or five runs at any time because we’ve got some guys this year that can hit the ball over the outfielder’s heads,” said Van Zant.
“This is a big win for us, especially how the outcome of the game unfolded,” added Psomas. “It’s definitely a confidence-builder for us.”
West Virginia returns to the diamond this weekend for a three-game series against Eastern Michigan starting with a 1 p.m. twinbill on Saturday.
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