The Saline Reporter
A Heritage Newspaper
Weekly Publication
Hornets take down Bulldogs 5-2
By Jerry Hinnen, Staff Writer
PUBLISHED: May 10, 2007
After the Saline baseball team scored three runs in 14 innings Thursday in splitting a doubleheader with Bedford, conventional wisdom might have suggested the Hornets would struggle against Chelsea ace Chad Nielsen on Monday.
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Conventional wisdom, in this case, would have been wrong.
The Hornets tagged Nielsen for 11 hits and five runs and Vinnie Haynes went the distance on the mound as Saline defeated the homestanding Bulldogs 5-2.
"That was probably the best ballgame we've played this year, offensively and defensively," Saline head coach Scott Theisen said afterward. "Our pitching and defense have been carrying us, so any time we hit the ball like we did, we're going to have a good opportunity to win the ballgame ... Thursday was exactly what we needed."
The Hornets wasted little time against Nielsen, taking a 1-0 lead in the top of the first. Derek Fairchild walked and went on to score after back-to-back two-out singles from sophomores Jeff Baublit and catcher Brad Guenther.
The sophomore hit parade continued in the top of the second as Josh Burd led off with the first home run of his varsity career for a 2-0 lead. Guenther then picked up his second RBI of the game in the third, driving in Casey Dishman from second.
Although Chelsea reached base in four of the first five innings, Haynes either picked off or stranded each baserunner to take a shutout into the sixth. An uncharacteristic throwing error by Dishman and a two-out Chelsea double, however, trimmed the Saline lead to 3-1 entering the seventh.
The Hornets would add two valuable insurance runs in the top half of the inning. Fairchild led off with a double and scored immediately on Dishman's RBI single. Two batters later Spencer Didion doubled to stretch the margin back to four.
Chelsea would score one run in the bottom half and bring the tying run to the plate in the person of Adam Connell, but Haynes forced Connell into a pop out to second to end the game and earn the complete game win.
"Vinnie's conditioning is starting to improve," Theisen said of his big junior pitcher and first baseman. "He kept the ball down, got ahead in the count, and made some good pitches. He was very effective."
Saline nearly pulled off a sweep in game 2 of the double-header. The Hornets scored three in the second on RBI doubles by Nick Poloni and Fairchild, then added two more in the third as Baublit and Guenther scored with the help of a Didion sacrifice and a pair of Chelsea wild pitches.
The 5-0 lead, however, would not stand up. Aaron Nagy left after five innings with a 5-3 lead and Jon Endicott came on to pitch a scoreless sixth.
But the Bulldogs pushed two across the plate in the bottom of the seventh to tie the game at 5. Endicott forced a ground-out to send the game into extra innings, but the game was called on account of darkness and will be finished at a later date.
Despite their offensive struggles against Bedford in their Thursday double-header, Saline came away with a split when Haynes executed a suicide squeeze for the winning run in a 3-2 game 1 win.
In game 2 the Saline bats went completely cold as the visiting Mules won a 1-0 pitcher's duel.
"The defense was there. The pitching was there," Theisen said. "But our offense only gave us two hits. Hopefully, now we've broken out of that. Time will tell."
Staff Writer Jerry Hinnen can be reached at 429-7380 or at jhinnen@heritage.com.
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