Army West Point Athletics
Army West Point
Bucknell
Army Splits Doubleheader, Series With Bucknell
April 13, 2014 | Baseball
April 13, 2014
WEST POINT, N.Y. – Bucknell’s Xavier Hammond threw a complete-game, two-hit shutout to lead the Bison to a 9-0 victory over Army in the Patriot League baseball series finale at Doubleday Field Sunday afternoon. The Black Knights and Bison split Sunday’s doubleheader and the four-game set.
Bucknell kept its hold on first place in the league standings at 19-14-1 overall and 9-3 in conference action. Army dropped to 22-12 overall and 7-4 in league play.
Daniel Cortes, who drove in three runs in the opener, and Patrick Mescher accounted for the Black Knights’ two hits. Jon Crucitti and Alex Jensen also reached base via the base on balls.
“I think we let them get a little bit of momentum at the end of game one,” interim head coach Matt Reid said. “We have two very tough weekends coming up. We have to come out and play like we did in game one today. That was Army baseball. We need to practice hard and play really well against a good Hartford team leading into next weekend."
Hammond improved to 2-4 on the season, striking out six and walking two. Army’s Brock Davidson suffered the loss, his first of the season (3-1), giving up five earned runs on eight hits in three and one-third innings. He struck out four and walked two. Patrick Gardner and Justin French combined to throw the final two and one-third innings, giving up no runs on two hits.
Corey Furman led the Bucknell offense, which pounded out 16 hits, with five singles, two RBI and two runs scored. Joe Ogren had three hits and two runs batted in, while Tommy Pennington and Greg Wasikowski each had two hits. Rob Krentzman accounted for two runs batted in.
Bucknell jumped on top, 2-0, in the second inning on RBI singles by Wasikowski and Furman. They added three more in the fourth, including another run-scoring hit by Furman and a bases loaded single by Krentzman that plated two more. The Bison’s sixth run came in the fifth inning on an RBI single by Ogren.
Meanwhile, Hammond faced the minimum through three innings, and just 16 batters through five innings. He allowed only one runner in scoring position for the game. Crucitti reached on a walk in the sixth, stole second and moved to third on an errant throw by the first baseman after Hammond threw behind the runner on a pickoff attempt.
The Bison capped the scoring with a three-run seventh. Ogren doubled down the left field line to bring home the first run, and a sacrifice fly into foul territory in left by Jon Mayer brought home the second run. Anthony Gingerelli plated the final run with a single to left that brought Ogren home from third.
This weekend marked Army’s final home appearance until May 2 versus Cincinnati. The Black Knights travel to Hartford on Wednesday before its next Patriot League series at Holy Cross next weekend.
