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Baseball team has close one

by Dave Bechhoefer

This week was not as terrible a week for the baseball team as their weeks tend to be, though they had a frustrating loss to Kenyon College at home on Saturday and a disheartening defeat to Allegheny College on Monday. The team lost 5-4, 3-2 to Kenyon and 8-4, 22-4 to nationally ranked Allegheny.

With good weather and a plethora of athletic events held on north field, Saturday's home game was fairly well-attended. Coach Todd Mooney said, "It was a nice crowd, there were a lot of students. There was some kind of Frisbee tournament on and when that was over a lot of them came over to watch the game."

In spite of the decent turnout, any boost from the crowd was not enough to prevent the Yeomen from making two errors in the bottom of the seventh that led to two Kenyon runs and lost the team the game after leading 4-3. Mooney attributed these errors to a "lack of experience in tight games. You can't afford to relax at all until it's done."

"We pretty much gave them the game, " sophomore Dave Schummers said.

The second game was also a close one and started out with Oberlin still thinking about the sudden upset of the previous inning. "We started poorly," Mooney said. "They jumped out on us, we were shocked by the result of the first game and we basically came up short."

Sophomore Mike Fradin was 5-8 on the day. He had two RBI's and scored three runs. Schummers was 2-4 for the second game and scored a run. Sophomore Carson Keeble and first-year Matt Burns were the starting pitchers for the two games. They both pitched complete games and they both gave up only one un-earned run. "They're pitching very well and in games they pitch well in we're not picking them up and costing them wins," Mooney said.

Schummers said, "Any game Carson starts in we can win."

"I think we played pretty well," Mooney said. "I was disappointed because we had lots of chances in both games. We were a better team and that's why the losses hurt so much." Allegheny, one of the stronger teams in the North Coast Athletic Conference, let Oberlin give them most of their first game. The Yeomen were down 8-0 in the bottom of the seventh before battling back to end the game 8-4. "We had a four-run rally and left the bases loaded," Schummers said. "It was too little too late."

"I'm sure we were all there," Mooney said. "We gave them some runs we shouldn't have and finally woke up to make the score respectable. One thing I've been trying to impress upon the guys is their capability to score more than four runs an inning."

The second loss was a 22-4 trouncing. "The best way I can describe it was as a nightmare," Mooney said. "They had 20 hits. Four of those were home runs and one of those was a grand slam. I give credit to all those Allegheny kids because they can hit the ball very well. Also our pitchers didn't put the ball in the right location for our defense. There were lots of hits across the strike zone and when that happens the opponents hit totals go up."

"We just let them beat up on us," Schummers said. He was 2-3 with one run in the first game. Junior Nate Walsh was 2-4 with one RBI during the second game.

Saturday the team plays Denison University before playing out-of-region Heidelburg University on Monday. The team seems to feel fairly confident about their chances against Denison. "Team wise they're a lot like Kenyon," Mooney said. "They just swept Kenyon, winning by one run. We should match up very well."

Schummers said, "We can play with Denison. They're not a team that can beat us, we'll have to beat ourselves to lose."

As for the team in general, Mooney looks at this game as the type to give his program more respectability. "When you're trying to turn a program around, it's the Kenyons and the Denisons of the world, those closest to you in the standings, that need to be beat."

The coach also thinks that the conference is extremely difficult, making it even harder to turn the team around. There are three teams, Allegheny, the College of Wooster, and Ohio Wesleyan University that are all nationally ranked, at around the tenth position. "We're competing with teams like that in our conference," Mooney said.

The coach is looking towards next year's class to also help give the team a better season. He said that the team already has four committed first-years with good baseball histories out of a potential 25 to 30. Mooney expects about ten to 12, and "any more would be a bonus." About the recruits Mooney said, "That's the only way to turn the corner. To compete with the Woosters, the Alleghenies, and the Ohio Wesleyans, that's what we're striving for."

Schummers is also looking forward to upcoming seasons and thinks this season will serve as a stepping-stone towards them. "We're starting to play solid baseball. We're finally starting to hit the ball and we're making less errors. I'm looking forward to next year."


Photo:
Good form, sir: Junior Brendan Cody comes up big at the plate. (photo by Adam Reitano)


Oberlin

Copyright © 1997, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 125, Number 22, April 25, 1997

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