Missouri takes two against Le Moyne
With a pair of wins and an immeasurable morale boost, the Missouri Tigers baseball team collected coach Tim Jamieson’s 550th win in the exact fashion he was looking for. Missouri swept Le Moyne in a double-header Saturday at Taylor Stadium, winning by counts of 7-4 and 4-2.
In the first game, the Tigers (6-9) rallied for five runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to reverse a 4-2 deficit. Four consecutive hits – three for extra bases – drove in the five runs Missouri needed to cap off the comeback. Senior reliever Phil McCormick made his Big 12-leading 11th appearance to work the final two innings for the victory.
The game stood as one of the most productive outputs by the Tiger offense all season as the team collected seven runs on 12 hits. Senior outfielder Jonah Schmidt led the offensive charge with two hits and three RBIs, while multi-hit games were also put forth by sophomore outfielder Brannon Champagne, junior third baseman Conner Mach, sophomore second baseman Eric Garcia and senior shortstop Jesse Santo.
Contributing to the offensive success was the team’s aggressive base running. Four of the team’s eight steals for the game came from Mach, a school record.
The offensive output was among a string of improved offensive performances in the series – an advancement triggered by an increase in aggressiveness, according to Champagne.
“Coach J told us that when we get our pitch to just swing it and not be afraid to get after it,” Champagne said. “We’ve been working on that in practice, just swinging the bat pretty hard. I feel like that’s helped a lot.”
In the nightcap, the Tigers rode a strong pitching collective pitching performance to complete the sweep. Senior starter Jeff Scardino and junior reliever Jeff Emens combined to limit Le Moyne to just two runs for the game.
Missouri generated just enough offense to record single runs in the second, third, fifth and sixth innings. They did so behind a combination of eight walks and eight steals, bringing the day’s steal total to eight. Champagne led the way with three of those.
“They gave us that,” Jamieson said. “By that I mean the pitchers didn’t do a very good job holding runners and the catcher didn’t do a very good job throwing.”
The real story of the day was the collective performance cashed in by the Missouri pitching staff. Behind quality starts from Scardino and junior game one starter Matt Stites and bullpen contributions from junior Dusty Ross, McCormick and Emens, the Tigers allowed just six runs in two games to complete the sweep.
“We just had a great staff performance today, both games,” Stites said.
The Tigers will look to take the final game of the four-game series tomorrow at 1 p.m.