Baseball Season Ends in Kingsport Bracket Championship
Kingsport, TN- At the start of the day Wednesday, Tennessee Wesleyan was scheduled to play their elimination game against the fourth-seeded Clarke University Pride at 11:00 AM. Thanks to a four-hour rain delay, the seventh game in the Kingsport Bracket of the 2018 NAIA Baseball National Championship Opening Round did not get started until 3:00 PM.
The visitors on the scoreboard, Clarke, put the Bulldogs in the hole early in the game with a run scored in the first inning. The road back to tying the score for TWU began with Tyler Halas' single through the hole at shortstop. An error on Halas' stolen base put him in scoring position on third base and a Collin Ridout hit scored Halas to tie the game 1-1.
Trailing 2-1 as the bottom of the fourth inning began, the first pitch Ridout saw was sent to shallow right field for a single. Aloysius Cruz's single to shallow right field moved Ridout to second base before a third consecutive single, this time from Dakota Phillips, scored Ridout to force the second tie in the game.
The bottom of the fifth inning opened with an Adrian Gonzalez walk and Malik Stephens' sacrifice bunt made it where a deep single would score Gonzalez from second. As the doctor ordered, a deep single came off the bat of Tristan Clarke to give the Bulldogs a 3-2 advantage.
It soon moved to a 5-2 advantage in the sixth inning. The bases soon became loaded off a Ridout single, Cruz walk and Phillips walk. A hit which snuck past the third baseman off Alfred Cruz's bat scored Ridout, and pinch-runner Kyle Tunnell scored off an error on the throw to the plate to give Tennessee Wesleyan the three-run advantage.
The game became tight though in the top of the seventh when the Pride scored two runs to cut the lead to one. Brantley Flanagan came into pitch and kept the opponents off the scoreboard for the remainder of the game to earn the save and advance the Bulldogs to another survival game against Southeastern University later that evening.
Alf. Cruz led the way at the plate with three hits, collecting an RBI off one of his hits. Carson Bach had seven strikeouts in 6.2 innings of work in the win while Flanagan worked 2.1 innings of the game for the save. With one win down, the team needed to win the second game on the day to force the "if necessary" game on Thursday.
TWU vs. Southeastern University Fire
There was about a 45-minute break between the two games for TWU. Once the game started, Halas got to swinging, connecting with a ball for a double. A double play ended the Bulldogs' scoring threat and the third out of the inning occurred before a Ridout walk could result in a run.
Grant Lang reached base via a walk to begin the third inning with Tennessee Wesleyan trailing 1-0. Stephens followed with a single to left field and a sacrifice bunt by Halas moved pinch-runner Tunnell and Stephens to second and third base. The side ended before the Bulldogs could get any runs across.
TWU struck back in the fourth inning though when Alo. Cruz sent a crushed a ball over the left field fence to tie the game 1-1. The tie was broken by the opposing Fire in the fifth inning as two runs gave the opponents a 3-1 advantage. The Bulldogs got one run back in the top of the sixth when an error by Southeastern allowed Phillips on base and a double to deep right by Mosley scored Phillips. The lead was extended once again by the Fire in the bottom of the sixth inning when four runs made the score 7-3.
The top of the eighth inning saw Tennessee Wesleyan get themselves back into the game. Ridout began the inning with a walk and was followed by Alo. Cruz's double. Phillips' connection with the ball caused the opposing second baseman to mishandle the base, scoring Ridout and putting runners on the corners with Alo. Cruz on third. Mosley's second double of the game resulted in his second RBI of the game as the runner on third crossed home plate to cut the deficit to three runs. A scoreless bottom half of the eighth inning showed the Bulldogs what they needed to do to extend the game with the top of the lineup coming to the plate.
An error on the ball Halas connected with allowed him to get on base and a second error on a Clarke batted ball got Halas to third base and Clarke to second base. Three straight outs ended the game and season for TWU.
Alo. Cruz led the way on offense, going 2-4 with two runs scored, one home run and an RBI. Halas, Mosley, and Stephens also finished with two hits for the Bulldogs.
Tennessee Wesleyan finished the season 39-21, the 13th straight season the team has won 35 or more games. Sitting at 17-16 on March 27th, the Bulldogs won 22 of their last 27 games.