Doug Eisenman April 17, 2009

Dutch upset No. 9-rated Beavers

PELLA—The Central College baseball team overcame deficits of two and three runs Friday and held 9th-ranked Buena Vista Univ. scoreless over the final four innings to earn a 6-5 win.

Buena Vista (21-6, 8-4 Iowa Conference) had opportunities to even the score at six after the Dutch (12-15, 7-7 Iowa Conference) took the lead in the fifth inning, but stranded runners in scoring position in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings thanks to clutch pitching from Central’s bullpen.

Freshman Corey Eisenmann (Bloomingdale, Ill., Driscoll Catholic HS) got the win to improve to 3-2 on the season, pitching 6.0 innings and giving up five runs on six hits. Eisenmann was followed by junior Trevor Talbott (Sioux City, East HS), senior Adam Squires (Center Point, Center Point Urbana HS) and junior Doug Eisenman (Grundy Center). The trio of relievers gave up a combined three hits in 3.0 innings of work, and Eisenman picked up his second save of the season.

“Corey (Eisenmann) did a great job just to keep us in the game today,” said head coach Adam Stevens. “And then our bullpen came in and did just what we needed them to do get us the win.”

Saturday start time changed—Because of rain expected later in the day, Central the start time for Saturday’s doubleheader with Buena Vista has been moved up to 10 a.m. the A.N. Kuyper Athletics Complex baseball field.

The Beavers took an early lead, capitalizing on two of Central’s six errors in the game and pushing two runs across the plate in the top of the second. The Dutch answered in their half of the third when shortstop Tyler Wivinis (freshman, Downers Grove, Ill., South HS) stroked a lead-off double and scored when the right fielder bobbled a single from center fielder Ben Tressel (senior, Dubuque, Hempstead HS). Tressel came around to score two batters later on a single to right by left fielder Caleb Rangel (sophomore, Rock Island, Ill., Alleman HS).

Buena Vista added three more runs in the fifth, taking advantage of two more errors by the Dutch. Down 5-2 Central answered right away. Rangel’s second sacrifice bunt of the day put runners on second and third with one out. A ground ball off the bat of right fielder Jarred Lackey (sophomore, Somerton, Ariz., Cibola HS) was mishandled, driving in Tressel and putting runners at the corners. Then second baseman Mike Furlong (freshman, Davenport, Assumption HS) singled up the middle to drive in third baseman Anthony Miller (sophomore, Davenport, Assumption HS), cutting the gap to 5-4. Senior designated hitter Derek Knutson (Richland, Wash., Yorkville (Ill.) HS) tied it up with a single to center to drive in Lackey, and a sacrifice fly by first baseman Jason Hassman (junior, Nora Springs, NSRF HS) gave the Dutch a lead they would not relinquish.

“It was nice to get a win over a good team like this,” Stevens said. “But what I really liked about today was the way we competed. We were in it the whole time and we had a lot of energy, which is something we’ve talked about a lot lately.”

Both teams worked hard to manufacture runs and combined for eight sacrifices on the day. Rangel was successful on two sacrifice bunts, Miller and Wivinis each had one, and Hassman had a sacrifice fly for Central.

Stevens said that the Dutch need to come out sharper tomorrow if they want to win the series over the nationally ranked Beavers.

“We made six errors today,” he said. “Tomorrow we need to come out and make those plays.”