TIFFIN, Ohio - It was like playing in a wind tunnel as the Tiffin University baseball team (6-20, 5-4 GLIAC) rallied to beat #18 Grand Valley State (16-7, 7-2) 8-7, Tuesday afternoon at Heminger Field. TU won the series for the second straight year.
The wind was howling in every possible direction, playing havoc with fly balls. In the third inning, sophomore Cole McCurry doubled to right center field. Sophomore Garrett Vernau doubled to right field to score McCurry. Following a ground out, sophomore Alex Hartley doubled to score Vernau.
Grand Valley State scored three runs in the fifth and sixth innings to take a 3-2 lead. In the bottom of the sixth, freshman Kyle Lento doubled to left center field and stole third. Freshman Isaac Perry singled to score Lento.
Freshman Devon Fisk doubled to move Perry to third. McCurry crushed a triple to right center field to clear the bases. That gave Tiffin a 5-3 lead. In the seventh, the Lakers scored two runs to tie the game. Outstanding catches by Vernau (crashing into the left field fence) and junior Nick Calandra (a diving grab in the air off of second) kept GVSU from scoring more.
In the bottom half of the seventh, Calandra singled and Hartley walked. A fly ball moved Calandra to third and he scored on a deep fly by junior Cody Spires. Grand Valley State would score two in the eighth to take a 7-6 lead.
The Dragons started their comeback with two outs in the ninth. Lento was hit by a pitch and replaced by senior Connor Wendt. Spires singled to move Wendt to second. The second baseman misplayed a ball hit by freshman Kyle Durham.
That moved Spires to third and put Wendt across the plate. Perry then dropped in a bloop single to left field to score Spires for the win.
For Tiffin, McCurry and Perry each had three hits and drove in two runs. Calandra, Lento and Spires had two hits apiece. Freshman Justin Bailey (1-1) gave up one hit and struck out one in one inning of work.
For GVSU, Jamie Potts and Kevin Zak had two hits each. Chris Ripple (0-1) gave up two hits, two runs, both unearned and struck out one in 2/3rd of an inning.
Tiffin hits the road, Saturday, April 5, taking on Malone. The doubleheader is scheduled to start at 1:00 p.m. Live stats are available at http://www.sidearmstats.com/malone/baseball/
-TIFFIN UNIVERSITY-
