OUA Baseball Roundup Sept 9-10
Sept 10
Guelph 11, Ryerson 3
Through six innings it was a pitcher's duel between starters Gryphons Mitchell Over and Rams right-handed veteran Caleb King. However, the powerful Guelph offence erupted for nine runs over the last three innings to defeat the Rams 11-3.
King was dominant over six innings staying ahead of the hitters, mixing his pitches and only allowing three hits and one earned run. "I was throwing strikes and got ahead of guys, and had some really good command" said King, "executing fastball command and location was good"
Head coach Ben Rich was pleased with King's performance and felt his ability to make adjustments showed signs of maturity as a pitcher. "Outstanding performance, he came out there attacking hitters," said Rich. "What I liked the most was he was making adjustments mid at bats. If he missed with a pitch he thought about what he needed to do to make a better pitch for the next one."
In the seventh inning Guelph faced King for the third time. They started the inning off with a bunt hit and then four well placed hits later King was removed from the game. Guelph has one of the deepest and most powerful lineups in the OUA, and they took advantage of opportunities to score seven in the inning. "A leadoff bunt which was a perfect bunt, from there a guy on first and things got away from me a little bit," said King.
Guelph would score two more runs off the young Rams bullpen to cement the win. It was an OUA debut of left-handed pitcher Matt MacDowell, who went two innings allowing one earned run. After the game MacDowell was generally pleased with his first outing. "It was really good, I felt my control was better than my exhibition games" said MacDowell. "I was throwing more strikes, trust with my stuff and a better curveball."
The Rams offense was only able to to get one hit off of the Guelph starter Over. Saturday's offensive star, Jared Armstrong, singled in the fifth and subsequently stole second and third before scoring on a ground out by rookie Sam Munro. Ryerson didn't fare much better off the Guelph bullpen and only scored two in the eighth off a single by Kyle Conquer.
Source: ryersonrams.ca
Ryerson 3, Guelph 1
After a one-year absence, Jeremias Sucre returned to the mound for Ryerson. He made a huge statement throwing the Rams first complete game of the season. Sucre pitched seven innings only allowing one run on five hits, two walks and recorded seven strikeouts. He was dominant from the first pitch of the game.
"To throw a complete game against a potent lineup like that, filling the zone the whole time…speechless…perfect" said Rich. Sucre attributed his success against the Guelph lineup to the location of his fastball. He was able to keep it down and avoided the hitting zone, as well as took advantage of the defence behind him.
"I was able to keep my fastball at the knees not trying to throw it up where they can hit is easily", said Sucre, "my defence made the plays which was very helpful as well." Sucre helped himself with his own defensive play. The two- way player plays third base for the Rams when he is not pitching. Sucre's infield skills were evident when he retired the lead off hitter in the top of the seventh. Gryphon's Tyler Randa laid down an excellent bunt and Sucre immediately jumped off the mound and made an off balanced throw to just beat him to first.
Ryerson's offense took advantage of the limited scoring opportunities against solid Guelph pitching. First baseman Pete Apostolopoulos was the hitting star driving in two of the three Rams runs. Apostolopoulos has battled forearm issues and it has limited him to hitting duties only. However, his condition continues to improve and he may start throwing next week.
"I felt a lot better as the games have been going on" said Apostolopoulos . "I think my performance is getting better and I am working things out with my swing." In the bottom of the sixth, the Rams took advantage of a tiring Gryphons pitcher Peter Zytner. Outfielder Jason Te hammered a lead off double and eventually scored what would be the winning run. "It was real late in the game you could tell he (Zytner) was really tired and his fastball was slowing down a bit," said Te "so I was sitting on the fastball and luckily he threw one over the plate."
Ryerson's next doubleheader will be this Saturday, September 16 against Queen's in Kingston. First pitch at 12 pm.
Source: ryersonrams.ca
Brock v Toronto (Game 1- 11-5 Brock, Game 2 - 9-8 Brock)
The Brock University baseball team opened the OUA regular season with a sweep over the Toronto Varsity Blues. The Badgers took Game One by the score of 11-5 and came from behind to win Game Two 9-8 at George Taylor Field Sunday afternoon.
In Game One, the Badgers trailed 4-2 after two innings. Over the next five innings, Brock collected eight runs to go up 10-4, on route to their first victory of the season.
Offensively, Brock was led by Matthew Legg (2-for-3, RBI), Dawson Veeneman (2-for-4) and Noah Koffman (2-for-5, RBI) who all collected two hits each. After being walked on three straight occasions, Justin Gideon got a pitch over the plate and belted his first homerun of the season with a two-run blast. Nick Spillman, Blake Stepien, Jaiden Hill and Matthew Casburn all added one hit a piece.
Starter Alex Nolan went three complete innings allowing four runs (2 earned) while fanning five and walking two. Picking up the victory was southpaw Andrew Raponi who threw three shutout innings not allowing a hit while walking four and striking out three.
In Game Two, the Badgers trailed 7-2 and rallied back to take an 8-7 lead. In the top of the 6th, Toronto tied the game 8-8 and in the bottom of the 7th with a runner on second, Koffman recorded a walkoff single for the game winner.
Leading the Badgers offense was Koffman (2-for-4, 2 RBI), Hill (2-for-2, 2 RBI), Gideon (2-for-3, RBI) who all collected two hits each. Newcomer Matt Pigat drove in two runs while Stepien, Tyler Nakamura and Legg all chipped in with one hit each.
Starting pitcher Chase Porter threw four innings allowing four runs on three hits while striking out seven and walking two. Bryson Maclean recorded the victory throwing a shutout inning in the seventh.
Source: gobadgers.ca
Other Scores:
Laurier 12, McMaster 0
Laurier 8, McMaster 2
Qestern 11, Queen's 8
Western 5, Queen's 4
Sept 9
McMaster 10, Ryerson 0
In the opener the Marauders rode an excellent start by right-hander Julian Tymochko, 5.0 IP, 3 hits, 0 runs and 6 strike outs, to shutout Ryerson 10-0. Rams ace Quinn Cumming struggled early in his first start of the season. He allowed fours runs in the first two innings and pitching coach Jon Rubin indicated after the game he told Cumming to attack the hitters with his fastball. "Cumming is good enough to pitch in the middle of the plate" said Rubin, "and he needed to have a simple approach and try to not come out too cute. Just attack the hitters."
Cumming listened to his pitching coach and dominated in the middle innings retiring 11 in a row before running out of steam in the sixth, surrendering two more runs. "He needs to build up his stamina and arm strength to go through the lineup multiple times and throw 100 pitches" said Rubin. Cumming was a closer during the summer and presently has only been stretched out to 80-85 pitches.
He might have lasted longer in the game had errors and misplays behind him not helped to elevate his pitch count. Luke Bellus, who followed Cumming, pitched a clean seventh but was tagged for four runs in the eighth. However, that inning would have played differently had a ball to the outfield not been lost by the fielder. Head coach Ben Rich referenced the defence after the game "Our defense has to tighten up. There are the obvious errors that everyone saw and then the plays that if we are going to win ballgames we got to make more of them" said Rich.
Bellus took his responsibility for that inning and said he needed to pitch better. "I had a batter down 0-2 and I left the pitch up and he hit it" said Bellus.
The offense was unable to muster anything against the Marauders pitchers Tymochko and left-hander Nikolas Motruk, who combined for the shutout. The Rams had an opportunity in the third, but both players Chris Aubin and Jesse Fishbaum were picked off first. Also in the sixth with the bases loaded and none out they were unable to cash any of the runners in to score.
Source: ryersonrams.ca
McMaster 12, Ryerson 7
Game two was a battle that saw both teams relinquish multi-run leads, but it was the Marauders that were able to persevere and win by the final the score 12-7.
Fourth year Sport Media student, Kevin MacDonald, gritted through four innings only surrendering three two out runs in the third. MacDonald said after the game that he was happy with his performance. "I got ahead of pretty much every hitter, when I needed to I bounced back when I made some bad pitches" said MacDonald.
What was more encouraging was how his shoulder felt after the start. "I feel really good, I felt I could have gone longer" said MacDonald. Last season MacDonald battled shoulder issues and it is important for the 2017 Rams to have him healthy. MacDonald left the game with a 7-3 lead but the inexperienced bullpen surrendered nine unanswered runs over three innings which lead to the Rams loss. Most of the damage was done by last year's rookie of the year, McMaster shortstop Lucas DaSilva. He went three for five with three runs scored.
"On the whole pitchers did a very solid job," said Rich, "but we got to finish off those innings. We would get one or two outs and then let them get back in on the inning, let a runner on and give up a hit – credit to Mac they came out swinging." The Rams scored seven runs in the third inning to take the lead. That was in large part due to the bat of veteran centre fielder Jared Armstrong. He led off the inning with a triple and then had a bases clearing double to give the Rams their largest lead of the game 7-3.
"I had an idea hitting in the seventh spot had an idea of what I was going to see" said Armstrong, "when you know what pitch you are going to swing at you are already ahead of the game."
Armstrong stressed the importance of the team needing to score more often and take advantage of opportunities in other situations. The Rams scored all of their runs in the double header in the seven run third of game two. Also were only able to muster one hit with runners in scoring position for both games, the double by Armstrong.
Source: ryersonrams.ca
Other Scores:
Toronto 11, Waterloo 0
Toronto 13, Waterloo 4
Western 9, Guelph 6
Guelph 8, Western 2
Queen's 5, Laurier, 4
Laurier 4, Queen's 0