COLUMBUS, Ohio – Ohio Dominican's baseball team scored three or more runs in three different innings in game two to record a 14-2 victory over Saginaw Valley and earn a split in Saturday's GLIAC twinbill after falling 8-3 in game one.

Ohio Dominican is now 9-13 on the season (5-3 GLIAC), while the Cardinals are 4-12 (2-4 GLIAC).

In game two, a six-run second inning jolted the Panthers, as junior Anthony Raschilla (Girard, Ohio) singled up the middle to start the frame and classmate Bryan Rudolph (Pickerington, Ohio) followed by ripping a 1-2 pitch over the wall in left field for his first home run of the season.

ODU was just getting started, though, as a pair of Cardinal errors and a walk loaded the bases for the Panthers with still nobody out. Sophomore Marcus Schluessler (Zanesville, Ohio) drilled a single to center that scored classmate Kevin Lydic (Dublin, Ohio), and sophomore Phil Jaskot (Upper Arlington, Ohio) would score on a wild pitch to make it 4-0. Senior Ryan Rovnak (Poland, Ohio) then delivered a sacrifice fly that plated sophomore Vince Bartolone (Broadview Heights, Ohio) and sophomore Kyle Tisdale (Uniontown, Ohio) closed the inning with a basehit through the right side that scored Schluessler.

Raschilla's sacrifice fly in the fourth made it 7-0 in favor of the Panthers, and ODU followed with three more runs in the fifth as Schluessler delivered another RBI basehit to center and freshman Collin Parcher (Napoleon, Ohio) drilled a two-run single to center as well.

The scoring output was more than enough for sophomore Daniel Mooney (Wauconda, Ill.), who tossed his second complete game of the season and improved to 3-2 on the year. He allowed just one earned run and seven hits while striking out seven.

Mooney induced a pair of double play groundouts, one in the first inning and another in the fourth, to stop SVSU rallies, and struck out the side swinging in the seventh.

The Panthers pounded out 15 hits in the nightcap, led by Schluessler's 4-for-5 performance at the dish. He scored three runs and drove in two while tying his career-high with the four hits.

Rovnak finished with two hits and a walk, along with two RBI, while extending his hitting streak to 13 straight games, and Tisdale and Bartolone had two hits apiece as well to lead the Panther charge.

In the opener, it was Saginaw Valley that took advantage of a big scoring inning, plating five runs in the third inning that proved too insurmountable for ODU.

The Panthers would answer the five-run inning with a tally of their own in the bottom half, as Rovnak doubled down the right field line to score Bartolone and make it a 5-1 ballgame. The Panthers then left two runners on board in the fourth, but inched closer in the fifth as Tisdale's RBI single brought in Rovnak and cut the deficit to 5-2.

Saginaw Valley answered, though, bringing home three runs of its own in the top of the sixth to take a six-run lead, and though ODU loaded the bases with none down in the seventh, the Panthers could manage just one run on Parcher's sacrifice fly.

The Cardinals out-hit ODU 10-7 in the first game, as sophomore Cole Carpenter (Zanesville, Ohio) took the loss for ODU, allowing six hits and five runs (four earned) in 4.2 innings.

Tisdale was the lone Panther with more than one hit, finishing 2-for-4 in the contest.

Ohio Dominican next heads to Hillsdale for a three-game series with the Chargers, beginning with a Tuesday doubleheader. First pitch is slated for 2 p.m. from Simpson Field.

Contact: Scott Miles
miless@ohiodominican.edu