Tiffin University baseball (13-18, 5-9 G-MAC) dropped a pair of close, competitive games on Saturday falling 4-2 in game one and 4-0 in game two to the red-hot Northwood Timberwolves who have now won 14 games in a row. The Timberwolves scored in the first inning of both games and the Dragons were unable to recover in either game.
The first inning was costly for the Dragons in game one and ultimately decided the outcome of the game. With two outs, Brandon Swope walked the bases loaded which later resulted in a two-out, bases clearing double to put the Timberwolves on top 3-0. In the top of the inning, TU left two runners on base.
An error by left fielder Griff Cady led to an unearned run to give the Timberwolves a 4-0 lead in the third inning. Dylan Ruhe led off the sixth inning with a double and Andrew Fairbrother followed with a walk. Griff Cady was then hit by a pitch to load the bases with one out, but Tiffin's only run of the inning came when Fairbrother scored on a wild pitch.
Northwood took their 4-1 lead into the ninth inning and the Dragons brought the tying run to the plate but once again could only push one across. With one out, Aidan Grabowski and Luke Westerman drew back-to-back walks and with two outs, Grabowski scored on an RBI single by Ty Hatfield. Dylan Ruhe struck out swinging to end the game.
Swope (L, 0-2) started and took the loss pitching 0.2 innings allowing three runs on one hit with three walks. Trent Hedges pitched 2.1 innings and allowed one unearned run with one strikeout. Mason Brunecz pitched 5.0 innings and allowed one hit with two strikeouts.
Hatfield, Ruhe, Cady, Cal Brazier, and Adam Deitschel had one hit each and Westerman walked twice.
In game two, Northwood's first inning rally began when the leadoff man was hit by a pitch by TU starter Johnathon Ray. That, coupled with a Tiffin error led to two first inning runs for the home team. In the second inning, Northwood added two more with a two-out, two-run single to make it 4-0 and that was all NU needed.
The Dragons had at least one base runner in all seven innings but couldn't push any runs across. The best scoring opportunity came in the fourth when Hatfield and Chavis Conceicao had back-to-back two-out hits to put runners on first and third but Westerman ended the inning with a fly out. In the seventh, Grabowski was hit by a pitch with two outs and the game ended on a groundout by Cady.
Ray (L, 2-2) started and went the distance pitching all 6.0 innings and allowed four runs on five hits with one walk and four strikeouts.
Hatfield went 3-for-3 at the plate and Cady was 2-for-4.
