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Championship Central |
Bracket
OZARK, Mo. – The first day of the 2018 Great Lakes Valley Conference Baseball Championship Tournament is in the books, and the story of the day was the upsets. Three lower-seeded teams picked up wins to remain in the winners’ bracket of the postseason event being played at US Baseball Park in Ozark, Missouri.
No. 4 West seed Missouri S&T capped off the thrilling opening round with a 5-2 upset win over top-seeded and East Division Champion Illinois Springfield, which entered the contest ranked No. 2/4 nationally. Despite giving up a solo home run in the first inning to UIS shortstop Cole Taylor, Missouri S&T’s Dalton Erger pitched a gem over 7.0 innings of work. He allowed just one earned run on three hits, while striking out eight batters and walking six. His counterpart, UIS hurler Justin Revels, was equally impressive through five innings with seven strikeouts, one walk and just one hit allowed. The turning point, however, came in the sixth frame when S&T posted all five of its runs in the inning. The upset win was sweet revenge for a Miners team that fell 17-4 at home to UIS on April 25.
Prior to the nightcap, fans witnessed the tournament’s first upset of a top seed, with the East’s 4-seed Indianapolis defeating the West’s top-seed Drury thanks to a monster seventh inning in which the Greyhounds came back from a 4-2 deficit to score eight runs. Jake Sprinkle nearly went the full nine, getting credit for the win in 8.0 innings on the rubber, while Devon Hensley was 2-for-4 on offense with a trio of RBI and a run scored. Storm Joop also notched three RBI with a 2-for-5 effort, including a game-opening solo homer on the first pitch thrown.
Game two saw No. 3W Maryville score a 5-2 win against #2E Bellarmine, as Andrew Peters threw 6 1/3 innings of no-hit ball until Brady Pfaadt registered the Knights’ first hit of the game with a solo home run, prompting Peters’ exit. Zach Morrisey came in for the final 1 1/3 to earn his fifth save this season. At the plate for the Saints, Dalton Schumer was 3-for-5 with a run and RBI.
Opening the tournament today, fans were treated to some free baseball in Game 1, as No. 2W Quincy earned an exciting extra-innings win over No. 3E Southern Indiana. The Hawks escaped the Screaming Eagles by the narrowest of margins at 5-4 in 10 frames, as Brynn Martinez went 3-for-5 and scored two runs, one of which was the game-winner off the sacrifice fly from Cody Birdsong. Down 3-2 in the top of the ninth, USI used a two-out rally to score two runs and take the lead 4-3. On the brink of being sent to the elimination bracket, Quincy staged its own two-out, ninth-inning rally to score a run and push the contest into extra frames, which proved to be the first extra-innings game in the league’s postseason tournament since 2014.
The first two contests on Friday will be elimination games. Drury and Bellarmine will battle at 9 a.m., followed by Southern Indiana and Illinois Springfield at 12:30 p.m. Following that second game, Maryville and Indianapolis will faceoff in the winner’s portion of the bracket, scheduled for 4 p.m., before the 7:30 p.m. matchup between Quincy and Missouri S&T closes out the second day of the postseason event.
Streaming on the GLVC Sports Network will continue for all games at
GLVCSN.com, on the iOS/Android mobile apps, or on the GLVCSN iOS/Android mobile apps, as well as on the Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Android TV OTT platforms. A replay of all games played on Thursday can be found on every platform by selecting the “On Demand” tab and searching for the stream.
Visit the championship homepage at
GLVCsports.com/2018baseball and follow the @
GLVCsports Twitter account for more information and other details.