FROSTBURG, Md – The eighth-ranked Frostburg State baseball team survived a ninth-inning scare as the Bobcats defeated Marietta 7-6 at Bob Wells Field, Sunday afternoon.
Trailing 7-4 going into the ninth, Marietta (12-10) was looking rally for an upset of the Bobcats (21-3) plating two runs in the inning but a well-timed double play and a fly ball to right field ended the rally as Frostburg walked away with the victory. The Pioneers did plate two runs in the frame, the first on an RBI single from Chris Pertrucci and the second on a double play with runners on first and third. With an apparent hit-and-run on, Eric White sharply hit a ball to senior Ricky Castro at shortstop who, from the seat of his pants, flipped it to sophomore JT Tipton covering second who completed with the double play to senior Ricky Brady at first. Freshman Tyler Hoffman earned his second save of the year getting a fly ball to right to end the frame and the game.
The Bobcats found themselves in unfamiliar territory this season after trailing 2-0 going into the third inning. With one out in the frame, senior Zach Weiss walked to load the bases for senior Nick Walker. Walker grounded out to first but brought home junior Zach Keeler to cut the Pioneer lead to 2-1.
The Pioneers led off the fourth with a single to left but senior Clayton Freimuth quickly erased the base runner with his first pick off of the day. The lefty quickly got two more outs as Marietta posted its first scoreless inning of the day.
Frostburg tied the ball game in the home half of the fourth on two hits and capitalizing on one Pioneer error. Junior Connor Cooper led off with a double to left field for the Bobcats second hit of the day. Senior Nick McElfish reached first on an infield single to third and the Marietta third baseman threw the ball away allowing McElfish to reach second and Cooper to come around to score and tie the game, 2-2.
After getting the leadoff batter to fly out to left, Freimuth erased a dropped third strike baserunner with his second pick off of the game as he caught Christian Demco wandering a little too far off first base.
The fifth, sixth and seventh innings were quiet for Marietta as Frostburg did its damage in the bottom of the seventh. With one out, Castro and Weiss strung together back-to-back hits to put runners on the corners. Walker sent a ball deep enough to right field to score Castro and give FSU its first lead of the game at 3-2. With two outs, Cooper hit ball back through the box and the Pioneers appeared to have their third out, but the MC shortstop mishandled the throw to get Brady at second and the error allowed Weiss to come around and score. With the inning extended, senior Lane Farmer singled to right center to score Brady before Tipton doubled home Cooper. Farmer scored what turned out to be the game's winning run on a wild pitch from the second Marietta pitcher of the inning. Frostburg led 7-2 after seven.
The Pioneers tacked on two runs in the eighth to cut into the Bobcat lead, 7-4, on two hits but Freimuth struck out the last batter he faced to limit the Pioneer scoring. After a quiet eighth from the Bobcats, the Pioneers scored in their final at bat, but the Bobcats held on to come away with the 7-6 victory.
Freimuth earned his sixth win of the year on the mound for FSU after going 8.0 innings, and allowing just four runs on eight hits and striking out five. Hoffman earned his second save by getting the final out of the ninth.
Farmer led the Bobcats at the plate with a pair of hits while scoring a run and driving in one while Walker collected a pair of RBI on the day.
The Bobcats return to action tomorrow as they welcome Penn State Harrisburg to Bob Wells Field for a 1:00 pm Capital Athletic Conference doubleheader.
