Baseball sweeps double header at Denison

By: Andrew Korba

GRANVILLE -- The Ohio Northern baseball team swept a double header at Denison on Thursday evening at the Big Red Field.

The Polar Bears improve to 26-12 on the season, while the Big Red drop to 18-18.

Both games were scheduled to be seven innings, but each contest went into extra innings.

ONU won Game 1 by a 4-2 score and captured the second game 4-3.

In the first game, senior Matt Magni (4-0) fired his second straight complete game, giving up two runs and striking out five batters.

Northern jumped on top in the first inning on a 2-run double by senior Ben Heskett.

Denison would score twice in the third inning to tie the game at 2-2.

The teams would remain deadlocked until the ninth inning.

Sophomore Nick Eltzroth reached on an error to lead off the inning and senior Daniel Rodriguez followed with a double.

Sophomore Reed Allen would come up and reach on a fielding error, allowing Eltzorth to score and give the Polar Bears a 3-2 lead.

A few batters later, junior Brady Foley singled to score Allen and make the score 4-2.

Magni would retire the side in order in the ninth to preserve the win.

In Game 2, Northern scored two times in the first on a RBI double from junior Jack LaMarca and a RBI groundout from junior Dan Belliveau.

The Big Red scored twice in the bottom of the frame to tie the game at 2-2.

In the third inning, LaMarca hit into a fielder's choice, scoring sophomore Cody Meyer.

But Denison came right back in the bottom of the frame to tie the game at 3-3.

The score would again be tied until the ninth, when Foley hit a sacrifice fly that scored Allen, giving the Polar Bears a 4-3 lead.

Foley worked out of a bases loaded jam in the ninth for his third save of the season.

Sophomore Alex Crabtree gave up one earned run over five innings, while striking out seven batters.

Junior Nick Anloague went 1.1 innings with two strikeouts to pick up his first win of the season.

Ohio Northern will close out the regular season on Saturday with a home double header against OAC leader and No. 8-ranked Heidelberg at 1 pm.

The Polar Bears currently sit in a tie for the fourth and final spot in the OAC Tournament.