Monday, April 18
Goodman Campus
1:00:00 PM
Lehigh University
7
vs
6
Army
Lehigh splits with Army in doubleheader and picks up big series win
4/19/2011 1:58:00 AM | Baseball
BETHLEHEM, Pa. – The Lehigh baseball team (21-15, 6-6) earned a split with the Army Black Knights on Monday afternoon in a 7-6 victory and a 12-9 loss on the Goodman campus. Lehigh finishes the weekend by taking three of four games from the defending Patriot League champs. Lehigh now sits in a three-way tie for second in the Patriot League standings.
"It was a really gritty performance by our team this entire weekend," said Lehigh head coach Sean Leary. "These were all very tight ball games and it was good for us to take three out of four games from a first place team. We were very resilient all weekend and I am very proud of our efforts."
Army struck first in game one as it scored two runs in the first inning off a single and two doubles. Lehigh got on the board in the bottom of the second. Kevin Mihalik continued his hot hitting with a single to lead off the inning. Then with two outs, Sean Killeen waked and Chad Warga singled to score Mihalik from second base. Killeen scored later in the inning on a passed ball. Lehigh cut the Army lead to 4-2 after two innings.
Lehigh had another big inning in the fourth, as Andy Russell and Mihalik each started the inning with back-to-back base hits. Casey Turner then singled to score Russell and cut the Black Knight advantage to 4-3. After Austin Borden drove in a run on a fielder's choice play to tie the game, Killeen snapped out of his slump with a big RBI double to give Lehigh the lead. A Warga RBI groundout gave Lehigh a 6-4 advantage after three innings.
Army added two runs in the fifth inning to provide a scare and tied the game at six. However, in the bottom of the sixth, McGaheran, who made it all the way to third base after a throwing error, was driven in by Billy Goldman on an RBI groundout on the game winning run. Cory Kent came in to shut the door and earned his third save of the weekend and seventh save of the year, two shy of his single season best of nine last year.
In game two, both teams collected double-digits in hits as the game lasted a lengthy 3 hours and 17 minutes. Army jumped out to a quick 4-0 lead in the top of the third innings. Lehigh however struck back with two runs in the bottom of third on a Brendan Pifer two-run homer to cut the lead in half.
The fourth inning was a rough one for Lehigh, as Army scored seven runs, two of which were unearned. However, the Mountain Hawks showed their resiliency as they did all weekend and gave Army a battle. The Brown and White scored three runs in the bottom of the fourth. One of those runs was a leadoff homer by Russell, his second of the season and 19th of his career, moving him into a tie for second place on Lehigh's all-time homerun list.
Lehigh then cut the lead to 11-6 in the fifth inning, as Russell doubled and advanced McGaheran to third base, which then set up a Mihalik RBI groundout. Then with the score 12-6 in the bottom of the eighth, Joe Abeln had an RBI single which was then followed by a Pifer RBI double to cut the deficit to 12-9. The Mountain Hawks were unable to capitalize in the ninth though and closed out a very successful series with a 12-9 loss.
Lehigh will be back in action this Wednesday as it hosts Penn at 3:30 p.m. on the Goodman campus.
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Tuesday, April 29
Baseball vs. Penn
Wednesday, March 19
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Sunday, March 16
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Thursday, February 13
