AUBURNDALE, Fla. – Junior Dylan Ketterer (Plymouth, Mass.) delivered a walk-off sacrifice fly to left field, which plated senior Jared Keller (Oxford, Conn.) to give the Curry College baseball team the 12-11 victory over Nebraska Wesleyan University on Wednesday afternoon at Lake Myrtle Park.
The Prairie Wolves took a 3-0 lead in the first inning. After the first two batters reached base, junior Derek Kolbush (Lincoln, Neb.) drove both of them in with a double to center field. With Kolbush on second and one out, freshman John Haimowitz (Valencia, Calif.) sent Kolbush home with a single up the middle.
The Colonels scored three runs of their own in the second inning, all with two outs. Senior Adam Duarte (East Providence, R.I.) was the first to get aboard with a walk. Freshman Matthew Jones (Brooklyn, N.Y.) followed with a single to left field. Junior Garrett Fosher (Exeter, N.H.) drove in the first Curry run with a single to right. Keller contributed a single through the left side to send Jones home. The Colonels got its last run of the frame via a wild pitch, which Fosher scored on to knot the game at three.
Nebraska Wesleyan broke the tie in the third with three more runs. Haimowitz registered a double to center field to bring home Kolbush. Sophomore Draven Ray (Plattsmouth, Neb.) brought in two more with a single up the middle to give the Prarie Wolves a 6-3 advantage.
The Colonels cut into the deficit when sophomore Riley Cronin (East Providence, R.I.) and senior Jhonathan Oliveira (Peabody, Mass.) scored off an error by the Nebraska Wesleyan sophomore second baseman Kaleb Knox (Moreno Valley, Calif.) to make the score 6-5.
The Prarie Wolves brought 10 batters to the plate in the fourth inning, tallying four runs to increase the lead to 10-5. Knox singled to center field to bring around junior Riley Ward (Lincoln, Neb.), Haimowitz recorded a sacrifice fly to center, junior Mason Bennett (Lincoln, Neb.) singled to short, and sophomore Aaron Nichols (Lincoln, Neb.) was hit by a pitch as plays in which manufactured runs.
Curry chipped away with two more runs in the fifth. Cronin scored on a passed ball and Fosher sent a single to left to score Duarte to trim the deficit to four, 10-7.
Nebraska Wesleyan got a run back in the seventh on a Ward double to left to put the lead at 11-7.
That would be the last the Prairie Wolves would score in the contest. The Colonels brought three runs home in the seventh on three straight plays. Keller singled to right, Leonard had a base hit to right, and freshman John Trevino (Edinburg, Texas) all drove in runs to make the score 11-10.
Down 11-10 heading into the bottom of the ninth, Leonard sent in the tying run on a single to second base to plate Fosher. Ketterer's sacrifice fly to left field was deep enough to score Keller from third base for the one-run walk-off victory, 12-11.
The teams combined for 30 hits in the contest. Five Curry student-athletes finished with multiple hits, led by a 4-for-5 day from Keller. He also had two RBI and two runs scored. Bennett went 3-for-5 with an RBI and a run scored for Nebraska Wesleyan.
Sophomore Ryan Williams (Waltham, Mass.) was credited with the win on the hill for the Colonels. He tossed the last 5.2 innings and allowed one run on four hits with a strikeout. Junior Josh Seifert (Lincoln, Neb.) was tabbed with the loss, surrendering two runs on two hits with a pair of walks.
Curry (5-2 overall) will wrap up play in Florida on Thursday, March 12 against Medaille College for a doubleheader starting at 9:30 p.m.
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