CU takes Gehrig Division with three wins over Penn

With Friday’s sweep of Penn, the Columbia baseball team did away with the suspense early and earned a spot in the Ivy League Baseball Championship series. After securing the Gehrig Division, the Lions then went on to split Saturday’s contests to snag home-field advantage for next week’s title games.

The Lions needed just two wins, and the Columbia bats opened game one on Friday by posting three runs in the first two innings. Veteran outfielder Jason Banos doubled to bring in the first run, and Nick Crucet and Jon Eisen added two-out RBI knocks in the second to plate two more runs. The Lions then loaded the bases for Nick Ferraresi, but the right fielder flied out to his counterpart to end the inning.

Pat Lowery manned the mound for the Lions, and after a scoreless inning the ace threw a home run to Penn first baseman Will Gordon on the first pitch to start the second inning raising some hairs.

But Lowery settled in and retired the next eight hitters until Gordon again stepped to the plate. After getting ahead with two quick strikes, Gordon took Lowery deep to the same spot, but the home run would be Penn’s last run of the game.

In fact, Penn managed to scratch out just one more hit against Lowery, who threw the complete seven innings and improved his record to 4-3. Lowery allowed just two earned runs on three hits (two of which were the homers) and faced just three batters over the minimum in a dominating performance.

Although Lowery was humming along, Columbia was only up by one run until the seventh inning, in which the team added two more for insurance. Dario Pizzano smacked another homer to put the cap on the first game before Lowery retired the final three hitters in order.

Both offenses came alive in game two. Penn drew blood first with a run in its half of the first before putting up crooked numbers in the second and third innings. With nine hits over the two innings, Penn added five, and then three runs, taking a seven-run lead into the fourth inning.

Columbia starter Tim Giel was rocked for five earned runs and six hits and didn’t make it out of the second. Reliever Geoff Whitaker was similarly ineffective, allowing three more runs to cross the plate in just one-and-a-third innings of work.

After a walk and a chopper brought home two Columbia runs in the second, the Lions went to work on a seven-run deficit in the fifth inning. After the Light Blue put the first two men on base, Alex Aurrichio hit into a costly double play. But Ferraresi then reached on an error, scoring Eisen, and came around to score on a wild pitch later in the inning.

Columbia’s power finally broke through in the sixth inning. Two hits, a walk, and a throwing error chased Penn starter Todd Roth from the game. Trey Jennings came in to face Aurrichio and on a favorable 3-1 count, Aurrichio blasted a pitch to deep center for a monster three-run homer. Jennings was replaced a batter later without recording a single out.

The homer put the Lions within one, and four strong innings of two-hit shutout relief pitching by Eric Williams gave the team a chance to swallow the remaining deficit.

In the eighth inning, Banos hit a huge double to bring in the tying run and with the bases loaded, and Pizzano drove in the go-ahead run on a fielder’s choice. But the drama wasn’t quite over.

With two outs in the ninth, Penn loaded the bases before Zach Epstein—the fourth Columbia pitcher of the game—induced a line-out to end the game and earn his first save of the year.

The Lions went to sleep on Friday night with the Gehrig Division title in their hands, but home-field advantage was still up in the air when they returned to Robertson Field on Saturday.

Columbia came out swinging in the first inning, posting two runs. But Penn quickly retaliated with three runs in the third inning, courtesy of two Columbia errors. The teams went scoreless until Mike Mariano homered on an 0-2 count to lead off the sixth inning for Penn.

The Lions were only down by two heading into the seventh and final inning, but Whitaker and Derek Squires were unable to hold the game in place. Penn again took advantage of two Columbia errors and threw a giant six onto the board to the put game out of reach. Columbia went on to lose 10-2.

Determined to secure home-field advantage, Columbia scored three runs in the first and third innings of game two to take a 6-1 lead into the middle innings. The big bats came out again as Aurrichio and Pizzano both homered, accounting for five of the runs.

Ferraresi joined the party, leading off the sixth with another bomb before Aurrichio lit up the scoreboard with his second homer of the game, and third of the series, in the seventh inning. Aurrichio’s two homers brought his season total to 13, the most by a Lion in a single season since 1996 and the third most of all time. Pizzano is second on the team in home runs with 11.

The Lions took the field in the ninth inning with a seven-run lead, feeling pretty good about their chances for home-field advantage. Clay Bartlett, who came in to relieve starting pitcher Stefan Olson after seven quality innings, got one out before the trouble started.

The next four Penn hitters all reached base, knocking Bartlett out in the ninth. Alex Black took his place and promptly threw a juicy pitch to Penn’s Gordon, who jacked his third homer of the series, bringing two men with him around the bases. The Lions now held just a two-run lead, and the next batter doubled off of Black to bring the tying run to the plate. But the Lions finally recorded the final two outs on fly-outs to clinch home-field advantage and win their third Ivy League game out of four for the fourth time this season.

With the three wins over Penn, Columbia earned a date with Dartmouth—coincidentally, the team the Lions beat to win the 2008 championship—at home next weekend to play for the Ivy League Championship.