GREENWOOD - The Lander Baseball team trailed by as many as six runs and trailed by five with six outs to play but stormed all the way back with an eight-spot in the bottom of the eighth to take game three of their series with the Mars Hill Lions and, in turn, sweep the series.
With the win, Lander is back at .500, at 5-5, while Mars Hill drops to 3-9.
Evan Wickeri (Middleburg, Fla.) led all players with three hits, the biggest of which came in the eighth inning as he dropped a ball down the left-field line to score
Taichi Nakao (Auckland, New Zealand) and
Garrett Chun (Jacksonville, Fla.) to give Lander their first lead.
Luke Johnson (Anderson, S.C.) came in in the fifth inning and pitched four innings of shutout baseball, keeping Lander in the game, and earning himself the win - his first of the season - after the comeback.
Mars Hill jumped on Anson Merrick (Chapin, S.C) quickly as they capitalized on a couple of Lander errors to put up five runs in the first two innings. The Lions then added another run in the fourth on a wild pitch.
Lander was held off the board until the sixth inning when a Will McClellan (Anderson, S.C.) sacrifice fly scored Wickeri who led off the inning with a double.
Lander had left two runners on in the fifth and seventh, but that all changed in the eighth. After Grant Sherrod (Sumner, Wash.) got on with a single, back-to-back hit by pitches from McClellan and Zach Cowart (Lexington, S.C.) loaded the bases for Mario Lopez Jr. (Tampa, Fla.)Â
The grad student then doubled down the right-field line, clearing the bases and firing up the Bearcat dugout as the tying run approached the plate with the score 6-4.
Back-to-back walks by Brody Winter (Anderson, S.C.) and Chun loaded the bases again for Nakao who drew a bases-loaded walk of his own to bring Lander within one. After a strikeout, Wickeri, who had led off the inning, came to the plate. While a wild pitch brought home pinch runner Dalton Stroud (Green Sea, S.C.) to tie the game, Wickeri did the big damage as he plated two runs with his double to give Lander their first lead at 8-6.
After a cue shot single from Sherrod, a delayed double steal saw Wickeri score and put Lander up three at 9-6 heading into the final frame.
A couple of walks allowed Mars Hill to cut the lead down to one with an RBI single but Kurt Rogers (Westminster, S.C.) came in and got the last out via strikeout to earn his second save in as many days and secure the win.
The Lander Baseball team continues their homestand on Tuesday as they host the Belmont Abbey Crusaders for a midweek non-conference game. First pitch for that game is slated for 5:00 PM.
