The University of Minnesota Crookston baseball team’s bats continued to stay hot as they beat the St. Cloud State Huskies 15-11 in a non-conference game played in Fort Scott, Kansas on Monday.
UMC was the visiting team on the scoreboard and Ben Bryant (Soph. Fargo, ND) singled to lead off and Will Zimmerman (Sr. Park River, ND) hit a home run over the left-centerfield fence for a 2-0 lead.
The Golden Eagles added another run in the top of the second inning when Jake Hjelle (Fresh. East Grand Forks) singled. Bobby Chu (Sr. Redwood City, CA) reached on a fielder’s choice and Eli Jung (Jr. Dickinson, ND) walked. Landyn Swenson (Sr. Devils Lake, ND) singled to score Chu for a 3-0 lead.
In the top of the third inning, Brock Reller (Jr. Grand Forks, ND) hit a solo home run to start the inning and UMC took a 4-0 lead. St. Cloud State responded in the bottom of the inning with two runs on three hits to get within a 4-2 deficit.
In the top of the fourth, UMC continued to find ways to score as Bryant led off with a single, Zimmerman was hit by a pitch, and Mason Ruhlman (Sr. Algonac, Mich) walked to load the bases with nobody out. The next UMC batter struck out before Scott Finberg (Sr. Stillwater) was hit by a pitch to score a run. The Golden Eagles scored another run when Hjelle knocked in a run with a sacrifice fly for a 6-2 lead.
Neither team scored in the fifth inning, but St. Cloud State hit a solo home run in the sixth inning to get within a 6-3 deficit.
UMC got back to their scoring ways in the top of the seventh inning. The inning didn’t start well with back-to-back strikeouts, but Jung cracked a solo home run to give the Golden Eagles a 7-3 lead. UMC’s pitching has struggled in the late innings in their first two games, and unfortunately, it happened again in the third game of the year as St. Cloud State hit a couple of two-run homeruns to tie the game at 7-7.
UMC’s offense picked up the pitching for the third straight game as the Golden Eagles’ Zimmerman led off the eighth inning with a walk, followed by a Ruhlman single. Reller was intentionally walked for the third time in the last two games to load the bases. Finberg made the Huskies pay with a double to score two runs. Hjelle followed with a walk. Another UMC run scored on a ground out and the fourth run of the inning scored on a Swenson single for an 11-7 lead. St. Cloud State answered with another two-run home run in the bottom of the eighth inning to get within an 11-9 deficit.
The Golden Eagles scored some big insurance runs in the top of the ninth inning. Ruhlman walked and scored on a Reller triple to right field. Finberg was hit by a pitch and Hjelle hit a three-run blast over the left-field fence and UMC led 15-9 going into the bottom of the ninth inning. The insurance runs proved to be huge as St. Cloud State hit another two-run home run to get within a 15-11 deficit, but UMC shut the door after that and held on for a 15-11 victory.
UMC was led offensively by Landyn Swenson who was 3 for 5 with 2 rbi’s and a walk. Ben Bryant, Brock Reller, Jake Hjelle, and Eli Jung all had two hits apiece.
UMC improves to 3-0 on the year and will take on Bemidji State on Wednesday, in the final game played in Kansas. UMC will open up the Northern Sun Conference play on Saturday, March 20 at Winona State. The 3-0 record doesn’t count on UMC’s conference record, but they count in the regional rankings. The Huskies drop to 0-3 on the year.
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