Baseball falls in home opener, 3-1, to Defiance College
By: Jay Garneau
ADA — The Ohio Northern baseball team dropped its 2011 home opener to Defiance College, 3-1, Wednesday evening at Wander Field.
Defiance improves to 1-6 on the year with the win, while Ohio Northern drops to 5-3.
Junior Cody Fisher pitched well for ONU, allowing two earned runs and just three hits in 6.0 innings. He also struck out four batters.
Fellow junior Ryan Damman pitched well in relief, tossing 3.0 scoreless innings, allowing just one hit.
For Defiance, Darin Water threw a complete game, allowing one run and eight hits in 9.0 innings and striking out six batters.
Defiance got on the board first in the top of the third. After a leadoff double by Levi Pauli, the ONU defense made a number of miscues, which allowed two runs, one of them unearned.
The Yellow Jackets picked up another run in the fifth. Pauli hit his second leadoff double of the day and advanced to third on a groundout. Aaron Helland successfully executed a squeeze bunt to score Pauli, making it a 3-0 game.
ONU picked up its only run in the sixth. After sophomore Josh Murphy and junior Matt Hampshire started the inning with singles, sophomore Kevin Obarski sacrificed them both into scoring position. Sophomore Cory Martin drove in an RBI single into left field to knock in Murphy.
The Polar Bears had a tying opportunity in the seventh. With the bases loaded and nobody out, Waterman forced a foul out and double play to end the ONU threat.
ONU will look to end its three-game losing streak tomorrow, as the Polar Bears travel to Albion (Mich.) for a non-conference contest at 4 p.m.
