DII/SIAC/Baseball
MONTGOMERY, Ala. – Stillman College baseball ran the current winning streak to five games with a three game weekend series sweep at Tuskegee; 7-1, 8-3, and 15-12. Hunter Hood and Tim Rogers tossed back-to-back complete games on Saturday for the wins while Chip White picked up the Sunday victory.
In the opener on Saturday, Nick Vitale homered in a scoreless game in the top of the third inning to give Stillman the 1-0 advantage. The Tigers scored three times in the fourth, Albert Rafael stole home before Drew Burdsell scored on an error by the Tuskegee catcher, Pablo De Armas crossed for the final run of the inning on the RBI-double by Fernando Tanaka. The Golden Tigers scored their one run in the fourth inning before Stillman responded with one in the sixth and two more in the seventh. De Armas scored in the sixth on the ground out by Paul Winterbottom. Vitale added the two-RBI double to score Rafael and Burdsell in the seventh. Vitale and De Armas each recorded multi-hit games.
Hood (4-4) continued his dominant streak with his fourth consecutive win, third complete game in-a-row, and reaching double-digit strikeouts for the third time in four games with a career-high 13. He allowed just the one run and scattered five hits while walking three.
Rogers (2-2) added a career-high eight strikeouts as he continued the strong pitching performance on Saturday in the second game. Rogers mixed five hits and one walk while allowing three runs to score – all earned – for the victory.
Stillman (10-16, 9-2 SIAC) scored two in the first and four in the second to take the commanding lead. Tanaka and Winterbottom added second inning two-RBI hits to break the game open. Tuskegee added one in the fourth before Stillman scored two more in the sixth inning with Winterbottom adding the RBI and later scoring on a Lucas Bigler single. The home team staged a mini rally in the sixth with two runs to cap the scoring in the game. De Armas added a 3-for-5 day at the plate with three runs scored.
The Sunday finale saw Stillman use six pitchers – including three that failed to record an out and two position players tossing the final innings. De Armas doubled to score Vitale before scoring on a Winterbottom out, Tanaka later scored on a Taylor Ellis double for the 3-0 lead in the first. Tuskegee responded with four runs in the home half of the inning. Burdsell and Bigler scored in the second ahead of one run by Tuskegee for a 5-5 game after two innings. The Tigers scored four runs in the third inning and three more in the fifth inning for the 12-5 lead. Tuskegee added a run in the fifth inning to start a stretch of scoring in four straight innings for the home team. E.J. Perry and Josh McDaniels scored in the sixth inning to lead 14-6 lead before Tuskegee added one in the sixth, and two more in the seventh. Stillman got the final run of the game in the eighth when McDaniels came around to score on a Bigler single. Tuskegee scored three times in the eighth inning for all the runs in the game.
White (1-2) picked up his first victory with a career-high seven innings pitched. He yielded 14 hits and nine runs – eight earned – while striking out two and walking four. Armando Gonzalez, Dakota Todd, and Ben Miller struggled from the bullpen before Tanaka recorded three outs in his first pitching effort of the season. John Hutto pitched the final inning to complete the game.
Vitale, De Armas, Perry, McDaniels, and Bigler each recorded multiple hits with McDaniels and Bigler each scoring three times.
For the series, De Armas racked up eight hits and seven runs for team-highs while Winterbottom drove in eight RBI to lead Stillman. The Tigers travel this upcoming weekend to Kentucky State for another SIAC weekend series.