Baseball: Mountaineers Win 5th Straight
May 13, 2005 10:06 PM | General
May 13, 2005
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| Fagler |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – There was a time not too long ago when West Virginia couldn’t seem to win a one-run game. Now the Mountaineers have won back-to-back one-run nail-biters after Friday afternoon’s 1-0 win at Villanova in Plymouth Meeting, Pa.
That win is coming on the heels of Tuesday’s 6-5 road win at Akron in 11 innings.
In both instances the Mountaineers got outstanding starting pitching performances. On Friday senior Marty Fagler out-dueled Villanova ace Nick Allen to improve to 6-2 on the season. The lefthander came within one out of recording his first-career complete-game shutout and actually had it, but sophomore catcher David Carpenter was unable to secure Ryan Arcadia’s pop foul with two outs in the bottom of the ninth with the tying run standing on second base. Fagler then walked Arcadia to put the winning run on first and gave way to closer Todd Dunham.
“It wasn’t that easy of a play. It was only about 15-20 feet off the line in front of the first base dugout and instead of running the banana and staying behind it, David kind of over-ran it and caught the ball waste-high and it fell out of his glove,” Van Zant said. “I’m thinking, oh boy.”
Dunham worked a full count to Derek Shunk, who had two of Villanova’s eight hits, before the righthander got the shortstop to fly out to right to end the game.
“This is really the first time in Marty’s five-year career he’s been healthy and he pitched a tremendous game today,” said West Virginia coach Greg Van Zant. “He’s throwing pretty hard: he got a couple of fastballs by their hitters. He also had an effective breaking ball and a good changeup today.”
Fagler was able to work out of jams in the first, third, fifth and eighth innings. In the first Arcadia led off with a single to right and advanced to second on Shunk’s sacrifice bunt. Angelo Petracca reached on second baseman Tyler Kuhn’s error moving Arcadia to third, but Carpenter was able to gun down Petracca trying to steal second and Fagler got Jeremy Hunt to ground out to Kuhn to end the inning.
In the third a pair of Villanova singles put runners on first and third with two outs, but Fagler was able to get Hunt to pop out to second.
Fagler walked through the raindrops once again in the fifth when with one out, he walked Arcadia and then Shunk followed with a single to right through a drawn up infield. But West Virginia shortstop Doug Nelms turned a pretty inning-ending double-play on Petracca’s hard-hit ground ball.
In the eighth Petracca led off with a single and reached second on Hunt’s sacrifice bunt, but Fagler was able to get Alan Day to fly out to right and Andy Wendle out on strikes to end the inning.
The game’s lone run came in the sixth when Justin Jenkins got things going with a two-out single to center. Lee Fritz followed with a single to left center to move Jenkins to third. Stan Posluszny got a bouncer past Shunk into center to plate Jenkins.
The Mountaineers loaded the bases in the eighth and were looking for insurance, but Doug Nelms flied out to the deepest part of the ballpark to end the inning.
Fritz, Jenkins and Casey Bowling had a pair of hits each for West Virginia, now 24-26, 9-11. The Mountaineers have won a season-high five games in a row and are 13-8 since dropping a home game to Savannah State back on April 5.
“At one point in the year when Savannah State beat us and we were 11-18, I just thought man …,” said Van Zant. “We’ve got eight of our last 12 and the thing I’m happy about most is the guys have never quit. They just keep playing hard.”
Shunk, Petracca, and Wendle had two hits each for Villanova, now 26-17-1, 7-12-1. Wildcat ace Nick Allen took the loss and is now 6-5. He gave up just one run on eight hits with three strike outs and two walks in nine innings of work.
West Virginia and Villanova were the only two Big East teams to play Friday afternoon.
“We’re down to the last two weekends of the season and we’ve still got a shot at the playoffs,” said Van Zant.
The two teams will resume action Saturday with a single game at 3 pm. The two teams will wrap up the series with a noon game on Sunday.
