The Ashland University baseball team lost a heartbreaker on Saturday (May 22) morning, 6-2, to Davenport in the GLIAC Tournament in Lansing, Mich.
It was the first loss of the tournament for the Eagles (24-18), who will now play Grand Valley State or Wayne State at 6 p.m. Saturday. Ashland will have to win that game and two tomorrow over Davenport (29-14) in order to defend its GLIAC Tournament crown and claim the conference's automatic NCAA Tournament bid.
On Saturday morning, the Eagles took a 1-0 lead in the first inning when junior
Austin Eifrid was hit by pitch to lead off the game and scored on a double by senior
Garett Robberts.
The Eagles got their third straight strong pitching performance in the tournament with junior
Jacob Harsany not allowing a hit until a two-out single by Carson Eby in the fourth.
AU held its 1-0 lead until the sixth when Eby's two-run double gave the Panthers a 2-1 lead. Senior
Josh Smith came on to get the final out of the inning, leaving the bases loaded.
The Eagles tied the game in the seventh, loading the bases with the help of an error and Robberts hit a sac fly to score junior
Tim Zeller.
Zeller then came on to pitch, but ran into trouble in the eighth, loading the bases with two hits and a walk.
The Eagles turned to relief ace
Perry Bewley, but Gaetano Vallone hit a grand slam to give the Panthers a 6-2 lead.
Cal Djuraskovic (3-1) earned the win in relief for the Panthers, tossing three scoreless innings. Zeller (0-1) suffered the loss. Harsany gave up two runs onn five hits in 5 2/3 innings, walking four and striking out one.
Zeller reached base three times, going 1-for-1 with two walks while junior
Micah Allen and senior
Logan Stoldt had two hits each.
AU
BASE/BB
