Baseball Wraps up Regular Season with Doubleheader Sweep at Wartburg

The Buena Vista baseball team will head into next week’s Iowa Conference baseball tournament on a high note after it took the final two games in the weekend series with Wartburg College on Saturday afternoon, winning the opener, 2-1, and the finale, 12-8.

BVU got a strong pitching performance from Jon Ringblom (Omaha, Neb./Millard North) in game one, as he went six innings, allowing just one run on six hits, while walking only one and striking out five.  The only run he surrendered came on a one-out sacrifice fly in the fourth.  Three of the six hits he allowed in the contest, came in that inning.

BVU took advantage of some defensive miscues by the Knights to take the 1-0 lead in the third.  Sophomore Ryan Titman (Boone, Iowa/Boone) reached on a throwing error to lead-off the inning and advanced to second.  He moved up to third on a ground out two batters later, and after a Ryan Scheetz (Omaha,  Neb./Millard North) intentional walk, he scored when the pitcher threw wild on a pickoff attempt.

The Beavers, who were held to only two hits in the contest, got a lead-off walk from Brock Yossi (Dallas Center, Iowa/Dallas Center-Grimes) to start the seventh inning rally.  Yossi then moved to second on Neil Eddie’s (Owatonna, Minn./Owatonna) sacrifice before stealing third.  Dillon Plath’s (Omaha, Neb./Burke) RBI groundout proved to be the game-winner, as senior James Stone (Des Moines, Iowa/Johnston) came on to work around a two-out double by Wartburg in the bottom half to pick up his third save of the year.

BVU then came from behind in the finale, using a nine-run fifth inning to rally from a 7-1 deficit.

Wartburg scored two runs in both the first and third innings before pushing its margin to 7-1 with three more in the fourth.

The Beavers then came through with six hits during their nine-run frame.  The rally started when Plath was hit by a pitch to start the inning.  Later in the inning, he came through with a two-run singled.  Titman also tallied a pair of hits in the inning, as seven different players came through with an RBI.

Wartburg got a run back in the bottom half to make it 10-8, but the Beavers got a pair of runs on a two run single by Yossi in the sixth.

Yossi finished the game 2-for-3 with three RBI and two runs scored, while Joe Paletta (Omaha, Neb./Millard South) went 2-for-3 with an RBI and two runs scored.  Eddie also added a pair of hits, two RBI and a run scored, as Titman went 2-for-4 with an RBI and one run scored.

Brennan Holm (Fairmont, Minn.) improved to 2-0 after picking up the win in relief.  He pitched just one inning and allowed just one unearned run on one hit, while striking out one.

Lucas Hadaway (Sheldahl, Iowa/North Polk) picked up his first career save after working the final 2.1 innings and striking out two.

Buena Vista wraps up the regular season at 21-17 (13-11 IIAC), marking the program’s fourth straight 20-win season.  With tomorrow’s games at Gustavus Adolphus canceled, the Beavers are now off until they open the Iowa Conference Tournament on Thursday, May 10, in Cedar Rapids.

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