Portsmouth, OH – The Bears started their Spring Break off with a win against Miami-Hamilton Tuesday afternoon at the Branch.
Score: SSU 13 Miami OH University - Hamilton 12
Seth Pluta (SO/Wellington, Ohio) would get the start against the Harriers Tuesday afternoon and would go one and two thirds innings for the Bears giving up two runs on one hit with four walks and one strike out as well. Ryan Lambert (FR/Greenup, Kentucky) would be brought into the game to relieve Pluta and would provide the Bears with one and one thirds inning of relief pitching allowing one run with one walk and one strike out to complete his outing. Brody Riffe (SO/Portsmouth, Ohio) would then be brought into the game to relieve Lambert and would provide the Bears with two thirds innings allowing two un-earned runs. Seth Clement (SO/Kissimmee, Florida) would then get the call to the mound and would provide the Bears with four innings of relief work giving up seven runs on eight hits with three walks and three strikeouts as well. Dalton Phillips (SR/Hastings, Michigan) would then be substituted into the game to close out the game for the bears in the top half of the ninth inning and would go onto get the win for the Bears.
The Bears would get their bats going in the bottom half of the Second inning on Tuesday as Dalton Phillips and Ben Sellers (JR/Evansville, Indiana) would get the inning started with a pair of base hits. Chase Thurber (SR/Andover, Ohio) would follow those up with an RBI single of his own scoring Phillips. After an Alex Medina (SR/Miami, Florida) walk Blake Marshall (SR/Lexington, Kentucky) would knock in Sellers on an RBI fielder's choice. Christian Helton (SR/Lexington, Kentucky) would come up hit an RBI single of his own scoring Thurber and bringing up Danny McGuire (SO/Cleveland, Ohio). McGuire would come up big for the Bears as well with a two run RBI double. After George Duran (FR/Orlando, Florida) would reach on a walk Phillips would come up again for the bears and get his second hit of the inning scoring McGuire as well. Duran would later score on a passed ball and that would cap off a seven-inning rally for the bears.
The Bears would remain scoreless but still leading the Harriers until the fifth inning when Miami-Hamilton would tie the game. The Bears would respond the following half inning however behind an RBI each from Duran and Phillips and then again in the bottom half of the sixth inning behind and RBI single from Thurber.
In the bottom half of the eighth inning the Bears would find themselves down two runs. Howie Rodriguez (FR/Orlando, Florida) would get the Bears their first run of the inning with a sacrifice fly scoring Sellers who had reached on a walk earlier in the inning.
Down by one run in the bottom half of the eighth inning Helton would come up huge for the Bears as he would launch a ball to left center scoring Anthony Nichols (SR/Fargo, North Dakota) who was substituted into the game for Medina who reached on a walk, as well as scoring CJ Radcliff who had been put back into the game after Kasey Wright (SR/Hawesville, Kentucky) reached on a walk while he was pinch hitting for Radcliff. Those two runs would be all it would take for the Bears to go onto defeat the Harriers.
The Bears return to action on Friday, March 15 where they will begin conference play against University of the Cumberlands at 3:00 pm.
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