DAVENPORT, Fla. – March 4, 2022 – Chatham baseball split its second double header of the young season, winning game one 11-3 and dropping game two 5-2 to Elms College on Friday afternoon. The Cougars record improves to 4-1 after the double header.
It was all Chatham in game one, with the Cougars scoring in each of the first four innings. It began with senior
Caleb Lehman collecting his 100th career hit, followed by a two-run dinger by junior
Brandon Griener in the top of the first to put the Cougars up 2-0. Then sophomore
Dylan Vogel singled to bring in another run in the top of the second.
The floodgates began to open in the third when Chatham got a quintet of RBI's. First, senior Corey Miller singled to make the score 4-0. Then a groundout allowed the fifth run to cross the plate. It was followed by three straight RBI singles by sophomore Frankie Deluca, Vogel and senior
Nico Cuello, putting the Cougars up 8-0.
In the top of the fourth, senior
Luke Paulson brought home two on a two-RBI single to balloon the Cougar lead to double digits. After a scoreless fifth, a bases loaded fielder's choice scored the 11
th and final run of game one for Chatham. Elms scored three in the bottom of the seventh, but by then it was too little too late as the Cougars cruised to victory.
Chatham was led by a combination of ubiquitous hitting with 14 base knocks and several Blazer errors, six of them to be exact. Four pitchers toed the rubber for Chatham, with sophomore
Dominic Costellic going 5.0 innings and picking up the win in an eight-strikeout performance. First-year
Drew Schreck pitched the sixth while classmate
Aidan Callinan and sophomore
Mason Schwartz closed the final inning out.
Game two was a much different story from the first one. Elms went out and scored the first five runs of the game, including one in the first and two in the fourth and fifth innings. Chatham scored in both the sixth and seventh innings with a Griener single and a double play that allowed the final run to score, but the Cougars were still handed their first loss of the season.
Pitching wise, junior
Eric Paulin took the loss after going 4.0 innings and striking out five. Schwartz went 1.0 inning while junior
JJ Shibest closed the final two innings of shutout ball, striking out two.
The Cougars close their Florida trip tomorrow morning with a 10:00 first pitch against Russell Sage.