GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. – The top-ranked Colorado Mesa baseball team battled back from a 9-0 deficit and came away with a 15-12 win over the Lubbock Christian Chaps on Thursday (May 14) evening on the opening day of the NCAA South Central Region Tournament at The Diamond at Hamilton Ballpark.
Lubbock Christian scored six runs in the top of the first inning before the Mavericks even came to bat. The Chaps added three more runs in the top of the second to take a 9-0 lead into the bottom half of the inning.
Kennedy Hara got the Mavericks on the board in the bottom of the second on a sacrifice fly followed by a
Joey Blank RBI single made it 9-2 heading into the third.
CJ Zwahlen took the ball in the second to get the final out then proceeded to pitch four more innings of shutout baseball giving Colorado Mesa life to mount a comeback. In all, the senior allowed three hits over four and a third shutout innings that included five strikeouts.
The Mavericks used the long ball to climb back in the third inning.
Jackson Lapiner hit a solo home run to deep right center field. Then with two outs and an extended inning due to an error, a walk and a hit by pitch,
Joey Blank stepped to the plate and delivered a towering grand slam to left field that brought the score to 9-7 after three innings.
Colorado Mesa chased First Team All-Lone Star Conference pitcher Aaron Rubio after just three innings of work.
The junior added a sacrifice fly in the fifth inning to make the score 9-8. Blank finished the game 3-for-4 with a run scored and six runs driven in.
Redshirt freshman
Trevor Tse knotted the game at 9-9 in the sixth inning after an RBI single up the middle that brought around
Tate Blasi.
Colorado Mesa exploded for six runs in the sixth inning to make it 15-9 with just six outs remaining for Lubbock Christian. Three RBI doubles in the inning by Blasi,
Cameron Cartwright and
Rocco DiFrancesco highlighted the effort.
The Chaps added a pair of home runs in the top of the ninth inning but that was all they could muster as they were eliminated after losing their second game of the day.
Six of the nine starters for the Mavericks finished the game with two or more hits with
Rocco DiFrancesco and
Cameron Cartwright leading the team in runs scored with four and three respectively.
Jett Walker earned the win on the mound as he pitched a scoreless seventh and eighth inning and allowed one hit while striking out two. Walker improved his record to 4-2 on the season.
With the win, the Mavericks earned their 50
th win of the season and their 50
th NCAA Tournament victory. It is just the third time in the program's history that Colorado Mesa has earned 50 wins in a season.
The Mavericks will take on St. Mary's tomorrow evening at 7:00pm in the first game of the best-of-three series with the Rattlers. The winner of the best-of-three series will advance to the NCAA South Central Super Region Tournament next week.
