Bowling Green State University
NORTHERN ILLINOIS
Falcons Sweep The Huskies With 4-1 Win On Sunday
March 30, 2008 | Baseball
March 30, 2008
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - For the third time in as many days, an outstanding pitching performance on the mound keyed a victory for the Bowling Green State University baseball team on Sunday as they defeated the Northern Illinois Huskies 4-1 at Warren E. Steller Field. Junior right-hander Kevin Leady took his crack this time at shutting down the NIU bats as he gave up just one unearned run on four hits and fanned six as the Falcons earned their first opening Mid-American Conference series sweep since 2003 improving to 11-7 overall and 3-0 in the MAC, while the Huskies fell to 9-14 and 3-3, respectively.
Just as they did in the previous two days, the Falcons got themselves an early lead and turned things over to the pitching staff. They would score a single run in the bottom half of the third inning and three more in the fifth, holding NIU to a single run in the top part of the sixth.
Leady, who made his third start of the season in the game, wouldn't allow a single hit in the game's first three innings as the only two Huskie batters to reach base came via two errors in the field. The Luckey, Ohio native came within a single strikeout of his career-high as finally in the sixth the Huskies were able to find a dent in his armor.
Unfortunately for NIU, that dent came too little too late, as the Falcons had already dented up Huskie left-hander Matt Jernstad for four runs in the game's first five innings.
A hard one-out single by T. J. Blanton would be followed up by an RBI-double to left by Ryan Shay to score the first Falcon run in the third. Shay also would be responsible for the second BG run in the bottom part of the fifth. With two on, he lined his first offering right back up the middle for an RBI single that scored Marty Baird from third and put T.J. Blanton on third. Blanton was then platted on an RBI sacrifice bunt by Andrew Foster, before Derek Spencer lined a double down the left field line that scored Shay to give BG a 4-0 lead.
BG had three different batters collect two hits on the afternoon as Shay finished 2-for-4 with a game-high two RBI, while Blanton and Mark Galvin both finished 2-for-3.
Jernstad was finally replaced in the sixth after going 5.2 innings, allowing four runs on six hits. With the loss, he fell to 0-3 on the season as Dan Atkenson and Andy Deain tossed the final 2.1 innings.
After NIU found the board finally in the sixth, Leady would be replaced by senior reliever Nick Cantrell, who was equally as impressive. The Waldo, Ohio native allowed a single hit in the game's final three innings and fanned four to earn his first save of the season.
Earning the victory was Leady, who improved his record to 2-1 on the season and his earned run average to 1.17 in the effort.
On the day, the Falcons out-hit the Huskies, 8-5, as they were able to minimize the Huskie runs, despite committing a season-high five errors in the field.
BG will next take to the diamond on Tuesday (Apr. 1) when they head to Youngstown, Ohio to take on Youngstown State in midweek non-conference match-up. First pitch between the Falcons and Penguins is scheduled to be tossed at 3 p.m. Live statistics will be available for the game on www.bgsufalcons.com, via gametracker, which can be found on the baseball schedule page.
