ST. PAUL, Minn. — Summit League-leading St. Thomas scored in six consecutive innings, completing a 14-6 victory over South Dakota State to open a three-game baseball series at Koch Diamond. The game began Thursday before being suspended due to inclement weather and was completed Friday afternoon.
With the win, the Tommies improved to 18-13 overall and 12-3 in The Summit League. SDSU dropped to 7-25 overall and 4-10 in league play.
The two squads traded leads until UST gained the advantage for good with a four-run bottom of the sixth inning, breaking a 6-all tie. The first two runs of the frame scored without the benefit of a hit after two walks, an error, a wild pitch and a run-scoring groundout. The final two runs came via the long ball as Joe Roder hit his second home run of the game and Matthew Maulik followed with a homer of his own against Jackrabbit reliever Alex Clemons.
The Tommies again took advantage of free passes issued by the SDSU pitching staff to score two more times in the seventh inning and tack on another run in the eighth. In all, seven Jackrabbit hurlers combined to walk 14 batters in the game.
SDSU held the lead on two different occasions, including scoring the first run of the game. Carter Sintek led off the contest with a double to right-center, moved to third on a groundout by Nolan Grawe, and scored on a sacrifice fly by Luke Luskey.
Roder's first home run of the game gave St. Thomas a momentary 2-1 lead in the bottom of the third, but the Jackrabbits responded with a three-run top of the fourth that included a two-run double by Sintek that plated both Keagen Jirschele and Dagen Schramm. Nicholas Werk later scored the third run of the inning on another groundout by Grawe.
St. Thomas countered with a run in the bottom of the fourth and gained a 6-4 lead on a two-run double by Roder and RBI groundout by Brigs Richartz in the fifth. Roder ended the game 4-for-4 with six RBIs and three runs scored to lead a Tommie offense that notched a total of 12 hits.
The Jackrabbits knotted the game for the final time in the top of the sixth with another rally started by the bottom third of the order. Jirschele was hit by a pitch for the second time in the game and Schramm walked before Sintek lined a single to left field for his fourth hit of the game. Both Jirschele and Schramm scored on the play after the ball was misplayed in the outfield.
Sintek ended the day 4-for-5 with three RBIs for a Jackrabbit squad that mustered six hits on the day. Adam Benes and Schramm recorded SDSU's other hits.
Play was suspended due to rain and lightning in the bottom of the eighth with St. Thomas leading 13-6 after Joe Vos walked with the bases. When play resumed Friday, the first batter of the day, Max Moris, drew a bases-loaded walk for the final run of the game.
Zak Endres picked up the win in relief for St. Thomas after striking out five over 2 2/3 scoreless innings.
Jackrabbit starter Arlen Peters worked the first four innings, striking out two and walking four.
Marcus Kruzan, who entered the game with a 6-0 record, pitched the first 5 1/3 innings for UST and wound up with a no-decision after allowing six runs on six hits while striking out four and walking three.
UP NEXT
Game 2 of the series was scheduled to begin shortly after the conclusion of the suspended game. The series finale is slated for 1 p.m. Saturday.
NOTES
South Dakota State leads the all-time series, 13-5
Sintek recorded his 13th multi-hit game of the season, including his fourth three-hit performance
Owen Siegert had both his seven-game hitting streak and 16-game streak of reaching base safely come to an end
Nolan Grawe's six-game hitting streak also was snapped