PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Two excellent pitching performances, one from Cornell and another by Brown, set up a Saturday afternoon split at Murray Stadium. The Big Red baseball team won game one 3-0 before the Bears captured game two 6-3. Cornell moved to 11-24 (5-15 Ivy), while the Bears closed the day at 12-23 (7-13 Ivy).
The two teams will meet in a rubber game on Sunday, May 8 at 12 p.m.
Game One
Jason Apostle's solo home run in the second proved to be all Luke Yachinich would need, as the senior evened his record (4-4) by going the distance and allowing just six hits and two walks with six strikeouts in the shutout victory. Brown had two of its hits in the ninth as it put runners on first and second with one out, but couldn't score. Yacinich struck out Jacob Burley to close out the game with the complete game victory after 111 pitches.
Yacinich retired 11 in a row after Cornell added two runs to its total in the fifth, as those insurance runs put the game out of reach.
Five of the Big Red's nine hits went for extra bases, with
Max Jensen,
Wils Guy and
Ryan Porter each posting a pair of hits, with Porter adding a triple, a walk and a stolen base.
Apostle drove a 2-2 pitch over the wall in right for his third homer of the year to stake Yacinich to a lead, the Cornell cobbled together insurance runs in the fifth.
Joe Hollerbach drove one run in on a grounder to short, then Jensen drove in a run with a single to left to make it 3-0.
Gottam Santosh allowed just two hits over the final 4.1 innings of work for the Bears with three strikeouts. Six different Brown batters had a hit, with Ryan Marra and Reece Rappoli each going 1-for-3 with a walk.
Game Two
Ryan Marra's two-run homer in the first and Nathan Brasher's three-run shot in the third were part of the Bears' 6-0 lead out of the gates and that was plenty for Tobey McDonough.
McDonough struck out seven and allowed just five hits and one run in seven innings as the Bears salvaged the split.
The Big Red scratched together three runs over the final four innings, with
Sam Kaplan driving in two.
Jason Apostle and
Joe Hollerbach were both 2-for-4 on the afternoon and
Kevin Cushing did yeoman's work out of the bullpen, surrendering just one run and three hits over the final five innings.
Kaplan doubled in two runs in the eighth to help Cornell claw within 6-3 and the Big Red brought the tying run to the plate, but Brown was able to minimize the damage and get out of the jam.
