Baseball
 

April 14, 2009

Tiger Baseball Closes Home Schedule With Win Over Schreiner

San Antonio - The Trinity University Tigers finished up their regular-season home schedule with a 7-5 non-conference victory Tuesday night over the Schreiner University Mountaineers at E.M. Stevens Field.

Trinity, which edged Schreiner 7-6 on Feb. 24 in Kerrville, Texas, improved to 20-17. The Tigers were 11-6 this season in the friendly confines of their home field. The Mountaineers dropped to 14-20.

The Tigers (10-7 SCAC) travel to Jackson, Miss., for Saturday and Sunday SCAC games with the Millsaps College Majors (30-5, 13-4 SCAC). Millsaps is ranked No. 1 in the nation by d3baseball.com. Trinity  - the defending conference champion - will return to Jackson April 23-26 for the six-team, double-elimination SCAC Championship tournament.

Trinity got on the board first on Tuesday night, with two runs in the bottom of the first inning. The runs came courtesy of senior shortstop Stosh Hoover, who swatted a two-run home run, his fifth round-tripper of the campaign. Hoover and sophomore center fielder John Paillet scored on the play. Schreiner closed the gap with a run in the top of the second. The Mountaineers tied things up at 2-2, with a run in the fourth inning. Schreiner led 4-2 after producing two runs in  the top of the fifth.

But, Trinity responded in typical Tiger fashion, with five runs in the bottom half of the inning, to lead 7-4. Senior catcher Steven Ramos was responsible for two of those runs, as he hit a two RBI single to left field. Senior second baseman Jeff Claydon scored, as did junior first baseman Evan Jones. Senior left fielder Jordan Pennington started the scoring with a double to the right side, driving in first-year third baseman Ryan Sterk. Sophomore designated hitter Kyle Felix hit a SAC fly to right field, scoring Hoover. Pennington later scored on a wild pitch, to complete the Tigers’ runs.

Pennington  batted 2-5 with an RBI, a double and one run. He became the 16^th player in Trinity history to record 150 or more hits. Hoover hit 2-4 with two RBIs, a home run and two runs scored. He passed Jamie Brancoccio (1996-99) for ninth place in the career runs category. Ramos went 1-4 with two RBIs, and has 99 career hits.  

Tiger junior right-hander Eric Binder was the starting pitcher, going  4 2/3 innings. Binder allowed four runs (two earned), two hits, five walks and fanned five batters. Junior right-hander Andrew Lawson entered in the fifth inning and hurled 3 2/3 innings. Lawson, who earned the win, improved to 1-0. He allowed one run, three hits, one walk and struck out four batters. First-year right-handed pitcher Weston Haaf faced the final two batters and struck out both of them (swinging).  Haaf picked up his first save of the season.

The Tigers scored seven runs (all earned), cracked nine hits, made three errors and left 10 players on base. Schreiner scored five runs (three earned), with five hits, two errors and stranded 10 players.