O'Connor and Torres continue to swing hot bats as Pride take first two from Missouri Valley
PEOSTA, Iowa - Returning to their home field of A.J. Spiegel Park, the Clarke University baseball team remained unbeaten at home in their second and third home games of the season with a pair of wins over Missouri Valley College by scores of 4-2 and 11-1 on Friday afternoon.
The series opener was a quick, nearly 90-minute affair that had CU lefty Isaac Rohde throw his eighth complete game allowing two runs on four hits with eight strikeouts to move his record to 7-2 on the season. The only runs scored in the game by the Vikings was a wind-aided two-run home run just inside of the right field foul pole by Luke Brooks that tied the score at 2-2 in the top of the fourth inning.
The Pride scored their first two runs in the bottom of the second as that strong wind blowing out to right center pushed a Kainoa Torres shot to right center off the wall for an RBI triple as a the MVC right fielder bobbled the ball trying to collect it, allowing third base coach Anthony Razo to wave Torres around third as he slid in safely ahead of the tag to score on that triple with an error.
With the score tied at 2-2 in the bottom of the fourth, Torres came up again with two outs and a runner on third as he came through in the clutch with a single in the hold at short to score Bubba Thompson and give Clarke another lead.
That lead woulc be extended by a solo home run to left by Brendan O'Connor in the bottom of the fifth for his fourth of the season and give Rohde an insurance run before he would close out the sixth and seventh scoreless for the win.
Clarke's game two starter in Greg Bennett would finish with a similar line as Rohde as the only run surrendered was on a home run that came in the top of the first from MVC's Jumpei Ohashi to give the Vikings an early 1-0 lead.
Bennett would settle in nicely after the first, pitching around some hits, to a final line of one run on six hits and two walks with seven strikeouts over his six innings of work to move his pitching record to 4-1 on the year to move his team-leading ERA to 1.41 over 38.1 innings and a team-high 11 appearances.
The Pride offense took advantage of some Missouri Valley mistakes in the third inning as they scored four runs on three hits and two errors in the inning as those two errors came on the same play as second baseman Nick Jeffries misplayed a Johnny Blake ground ball then threw it low to first that also allowed Thompson to score from second on the play.
More pop from the Pride lineup would highlight the fourth inning as O'Connor would hit a three-run shot to left to make it an 8-1 game and tie him for the team lead in home runs with his fifth.
That tie for the team lead in home runs would last two batters as Thompson would smash a solo shot to right center for his sixth of the season as the Pride would add two more in the sixth to push their lead to 11-1 on another Torres RBI triple before he was driven home by Blake.
Torres has really provided depth run production for the Pride as of late, finding a home as the CU left fielder as he's driven in 12 of his 14 RBIs over the last seven games since getting inserted into left field in the series finale against Culver-Stockton on Mar. 27.
Clarke and Missouri Valley will finish up their four game series on Saturday afternoon at A.J. Spiegel park with the first game of the schedule scheduled to get started at 1:00 p.m. CT.