Tulane University
Northern Colorado
Green Wave Takes Game Two From Bears, 9-3
Mar 21, 2009 | Baseball
March 21, 2009
NEW ORLEANS- The Tulane baseball club notched their second victory over the Bears of Northern Colorado Saturday with a 9-3 win behind the efforts of designated hitter Karl Mundt, who went 3-3 in his first career start at Tulane, while the Green Wave's pitching kept the Bears off balance.
Tulane got on the board first, posting lone runs in the first, second and fourth innings and giving the Wave a 3-0 advantage. Nick Boullosa opened up the Tulane half of the first with a single and promptly stole second. Boullosa advanced to third on Powell's ground out to the pitcher and was later knocked in on a sacrifice fly off the bat of Seth Henry. Mundt was behind the Wave's next run in the second, knocking the one-out double to left for his first career hit. Drew Allain followed with a single back up to the box to plate Mundt, putting Tulane up 2-0. Allain scored the third Wave run in the bottom of the fourth after reaching base on a fielder's choice and stealing second, putting him in scoring position for Josh Prince, who singled him home.
Heading into the sixth, Tulane enjoyed a 3-0 lead before Northern Colorado answered back with three-run blast off the bat of designated hitter Kevin Sandberg to knot the game in their half of the sixth.
"You could see our guys felt like they had a comfort level with the three-nothing lead," head coach Rick Jones said. "As much as you preach it, you didn't see the sense of urgency in our at-bats until they tied the score, with the exception of Karl Mundt, who gave us a tremendous lift today."
Matt Petiton, who had started for Tulane, threw 5.1 innings, striking out four on a 67-pitch effort, was relieved by Preston Claiborne, who picked up the win in Saturday's contest, improving his record to 2-1.
"My coach called great pitches again and had confidence in me and I trust my defense behind me," Claiborne said. "Whenever I threw a pitch and needed to put the ball in play, I trusted them to make a play for me."
The Wave responded to the Bears' three-spot, putting up two runs in the bottom half of the frame. Steve Moritz worked his way on base after getting hit by a pitch from Bears' starter Jeff Sciba. Sciba went on to issue a walk to Mundt, followed by another free pass to Allain, who wore a pitch in the numbers. That was the last batter for Sciba, as the Bears called on Nate Steinmetz to face Prince with the bases loaded. Prince picked up his second RBI of the day on the sacrifice fly to center, scoring Moritz and giving Tulane the 4-3 lead. With runners at first and second and two outs, Boullosa got dotted to load the bases again. Everybody moved up on a wild pitch and Mundt's run extended Tulane's lead, 5-3.
"It's great to know that you have somewhat of a better cushion," Claiborne said. "When I came in and the game was tied, I think we realized `all right, we need to step up our game a little bit' and the very next inning, we put up two runs, then Schaffer got the big hit in the eighth."
The Wave picked up another run in the seventh when Sam Honeck led off the inning with a base on balls and later scored when Mundt picked up the RBI double to right field. The Wave didn't stop the run production there, as they built off the 6-3 lead in the eighth inning, when Henry picked up a one-out single and Honeck followed with a walk. The Bears sent Tony Crudo to the hill in relief of Forest Carpenter, who had started the eighth for Northern Colorado. Schaffer welcomed Crudo to the contest with a three-run bomb that gave Tulane the insurance runs to close out the ballgame.
Mason Griffin came in for Tulane to face the Bears in the top of the ninth and quickly retired the side, inducing three quick ground balls to secure the 9-3 win for the Green Wave.
Tulane will look to continue their winning ways Sunday as they take on Northern Colorado in game three of the weekend series at 1PM.
