ALLENDALE, Mich. – After dropping a pair of 4-3 games yesterday to the nation's top-ranked team, Ohio Dominican's baseball team again hung tight with Grand Valley State Sunday but fell short, falling 3-1 and 7-5 in ODU's season-finale.

The Panthers close their inaugural season in the GLIAC with a mark of 19-27 overall (16-19 GLIAC), which was good for fifth in the 10-team league. The No. 1/2 Lakers stretched their win streak to 25 straight games and improved to 45-3 (34-1 GLIAC) entering this week's conference's tournament.

In the opener, senior Zane Miller (London, Ohio) twirled a seven-hitter but suffered the loss, allowing just three runs (two earned) in a complete game outing. He struck out three and walked just one.

The Lakers scored a run in the second inning, and the game remained 1-0 through the first five innings. The Panthers went hitless and only had one baserunner through the first three frames, and threatened but did not score after one-out singles by junior Austin Grate (Fort Wayne, Ind.) and freshman Bryan Rudolph (Pickerington, Ohio) in the fourth.

In the sixth, ODU's bats finally brought home a run as senior Felix Brown (Philipsburg, St. Maarten) doubled to left-center, went to third on Grate's infield single and came in to score on a sac fly by Rudolph to even the score at one.

Grand Valley answered with two runs in its half of the sixth, though, aided by a pair Panther errors to grab a 3-1 lead. In the seventh, ODU threatened with two outs, as junior Evan Shaw (Delaware, Ohio) reached on a bunt single and senior Germaine McAlpine (Canton, Ohio) singled, but they were stranded on base as a pop out ended the game.

The Panthers finished with just six hits, two off the bat of Grate, in the opener, and only had three runners in scoring position.

In game two, ODU fell behind 7-1 early but rallied and had the tying run at the plate before falling short in the 7-5 contest.

GVSU jumped in front with three runs in each of the first two innings and tacked on another run in the third to take the six-run lead, with ODU's tally coming on a balk that scored Rudolph in the second. The Panthers got back on track with a run in the fourth after an RBI single by Nick DiNello (Boardman, Ohio) that scored Grate, and scored another run in the fifth after McAlpine reached on an error and came in on a wild pitch.

The score remained 7-3 as reliever Drew McGlone (Circleville, Ohio) kept GVSU off the scoreboard in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings. The Panthers had one last comeback in them in the seventh, though. After the first two hitters were retired, Brown doubled to left and Grate singled back up the box to plate him. Rudolph followed with a single, and Grate came in to score on a throwing error on the play. But the rally ended one batter later with a groundout to close the game.

ODU managed nine hits in game two, with multi-hit efforts off the bats of Brown, Rudolph and sophomore Andrew Powelson (Tallmadge, Ohio). Rudolph also walked twice, reaching base in all four plate appearances, while Grate scored two times.

McGlone was effective in relief, yielding just one run on three hits in four innings without issuing a walk.

The Panthers lost the four games to GVSU by a combined six runs. The Lakers' first 41 wins had come by an average of 6.5 runs per game.

Grate finished the weekend 5-for-11 (.455) with two runs and two RBI and Rudolph went 4-for-9 (.444) with a run and two batted in.

Contact: Scott Miles
miless@ohiodominican.edu