Sports
Baseball: Ohio Rallies But Falls Short, Buckeyes Win 6-5
By: Ian McConville
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Ohio baseball made a late surge, but came up one run shy of dethroning Ohio State on a chilly Tuesday night in Columbus, losing by a final score of 6-5.
Jake Madsen led off the scoring for Ohio with a second inning solo home run, but Ohio State answered right back in the home half of the second off a Josh Dezse RBI that scored David Corna to tie the game at 1.
The Buckeyes used a three run third inning to take the lead, which they would not relinquish the rest of the game. A Jeff Ciamacco RBI scored Kirby Pellant, followed by a Brad Hallberg RBI triple that drove in Ryan Cypret to push the Ohio State lead to 3-1. Ohio starting pitcher Tyler Backstrom was called for a balk, one of his two such calls on the evening, which brought Hallberg in from third and gave Ohio State a 3 run advantage.
Ohio State extended its lead by one in the fourth, when another Hallberg RBI scored Greg Solomon and gave the Buckeyes a 5-1 margin.
The Bobcats would not go quietly though, as Dan Schmidt’s three RBI double in the top of the fifth closed the Ohio State lead to just one. The Buckeyes regained one run in their half of the inning, as a Pellant RBI scored Brad Hutton and made the score 6-4 heading into the sixth.
After three quiet innings, Ohio stepped up in the home half on the ninth needing two runs to tie. A Madsen RBI scored Garrett Black to cut the lead to just one, but that was as close as the Bobcats would get as the rally ended with the Buckeyes coming out on top.
Backstrom fell to 0-2 on the year. He allowed seven hits and five earned runs in 3.1 innings of work, and watched his ERA rise from 4.82 to 7.11.
The performances of Madsen and Schmidt allowed Ohio to hang around late, but head coach Joe Carbone said that in order for his team to be successful, they will need to swing the bats instead of waiting on pitches.
“We did take some pitches tonight in some crucial situations that we shouldn’t have. Overall, we did a pretty decent job, but in two or three situations we needed to swing the bat and we didn’t, so that’s something we need to get better at and grow as a team and hopefully do a better job with against Ball State this weekend,” stated Carbone.
Ohio returns home to Bob Wren Stadium on Friday night to begin a weekend series with Ball State. First pitch is slated for 6 pm.