March 11, 2008
Assistant Coach Folmar's postgame podcast interview (3-11) (mp3)
Lantana, Fla. - UConn broke open what had been a close game throughout and a one-run game at the time with a seven-run eighth inning as the Huskies defeated Penn State 14-6 on Tuesday morning at the Papa John's Palm Beach Challenge. The game was the first of two games today for the Nittany Lions, who will play at Miami tonight.
The game was a back-and-forth affair throughout until the eighth inning. UConn jumped out to a 3-0 lead and also led 4-1 and 5-1 before the Nittany Lions cut the lead to 5-4 and later tied the game 5-5. The Huskies then took a 7-5 lead in the sixth inning before Penn State cut it back to one, 7-6 in the seventh. Reliever Calvin Grumley, the third pitcher of the day for Penn State, looked sharp in working a 1-2-3 seventh inning with two strikeouts but ran into trouble in the eighth but he gave up two singles and hit a batter to begin the eighth and relievers Scott Kelley and David Lutz were unable to stop the bleeding before UConn got its seven runs on four singles, four walks and two hit batsmen.
Although the game ended on a negative note for the Nittany Lions, there were several positive things that came out of the game on the offensive side. The Nittany Lions got at least 10 hits in the game for the fifth time this year, including two home runs. Landon Nakata hit his second of the year while Cory Wine hit his first. Seven of the nine players in the starting lineup got hits, led by number nine hitter Bobby Jacobs, who made his first career start and went 2-for-4 with a run. Nakata and Wes Borden each scored two runs apiece.
UConn scored a single run in the first inning and it took advantage of a Penn State error in the first to score an unearned run as Pierre LePage reached when a ball he hit went through the legs of Borden at third. He scored on Peter Fatse's double that was just out of the reach of Grant Youngblood's glove in left. Ryan Stobart did a good job of getting out of the ham as he got a groundout, a fly out and a strikeout to limit the damage.
In the second, the Huskies took a 3-0 lead with two mores runs. Mike Nemeth led off with a single to left. He was forced at second on a fielder's choice grounder when the relay throw from second pulled Wine off the bag at first. A grounder to the pitcher made the second out and put a runner at second, but back-to-back singles by Harold Brantley and LePage sandwiched around a stolen base by Brantley produced the two more runs.
Nakata led off the top of the third inning by taking a first pitch fastball from Dusty Odenbach over the fence in left field for his second home run of the year, which leads the team, to cut the lead to 3-1. Penn State then worked back-to-back one-out walks but were unable to push any more across as two deep flies by Brian Ernst and Rob Yodice were caught.
The Huskies got that run right back in the bottom of the third as Stobart hit Mike Olt with a pitch with one out. He stole second and then went to third on a passed ball and scored unearned on a groundout by Matt Karl. They then took a 5-1 lead with another single run in the fourth inning as they were helped along by an error by Stobart himself when he was unable to field a one-out bouncer back to the mound off the bat of Brantley, who, after several pickoff throws to first, stole second base and then scored on a single LePage who stuck out his bat at an outside pitch and dumped it into short center field for the RBI.
Landon Nakata smashed his second home run of the year on Tuesday. |
Penn State answered quickly in the top of the fifth and cut a four-run deficit to a one-run hole in a short period of time. Nakata drew a leadoff walk and Jacobs grounded a single through the left side. That was followed by Borden's single to left center that scored Nakata and Borden took second when the throw came in to third base. Jacobs scored on a balk by Odenbach that also moved Borden to third and Borden trotted home on Lou Picconi's sacrifice fly to make it 5-4.
Wine tied the game with a leadoff home run to left in the top of the sixth. The Nittany Lions had a runner thrown out at the plate to end the inning, however, as Youngblood was thrown out trying to score from first and Jacobs' double to deep left.
The tie was short-lived, however, as UConn hit a home run of its own in the bottom of the sixth, a one-out two-run shot by Fatse after LePage had singled to take a 7-5 lead. After Stobart gave up another single to Pat Mahoney, he was lifted in favor of Mike Pierce, who gave up a single to Olt to put runners at the corners before coming back to strike out Karl and get Nemeth on a groundout to end the frame.
Penn State was able to take advantage of a few fielding miscues by UConn to cut the lead back to one run in the seventh. Borden struck out to start the inning but when the ball wasn't caught by the catcher, Joe Pavone, Borden took off for first and then reached when Pavone's throw to first was off target. Picconi then grounded a ball right at second base but shortstop Olt bobbled it as he was attempting to make the putout at second and both runners were safe. They each moved up on a sacrifice by Ernst and Borden scored on a sacrifice fly by Yodice by the inning ended when Wine flied out to left.
With the bases loaded in the eighth, Grumley was lifted for Kelley, who issued two straight walks and then gave up a two-run single to Nemeth. After a fielder's choice grounder produced the first out, a sacrifice fly scored another run and then a sequence of a walk, an RBI single, another walk and a hit batsman with the bases loaded followed, the last three off Lutz, leading to two more runs.
The Nittany Lions will bus down to the Miami area tonight to take on second-ranked Miami tonight at 7:00 p.m. in Coral Gables, Fla. with Mike Wanamaker taking the hill. A live video feed of the game will be available through ACC Select, a premium video service that is available for $4.99 for tonight's game. Live audio will also be available through Miami's student radio station. Check the baseball schedule or the master schedule on GoPSUsports.com for links to audio, video and live stats.
Notes: Jacobs made his first career start at catcher for the Nittany Lions and recorded his first career hit with his fifth-inning single....Youngblood, making the third start of his career, also recorded his first career hit, a one-out single to left in the sixth inning....Wine moved into third place on the career putout list at Penn State when he recorded his fourth putout of the game to end the third inning, passing Chris Netwall. He now has 1,021 career putouts. Next up on the list is Clint Eury in second place with 1,119....Picconi has reached base safely in all nine games this year....Yodice now has RBI in three straight games....Tonight's game will be the first for the Nittany Lions this year against a ranked team. They went 5-6 against ranked teams last year.