No. 1 Baseball Wins Both Games in AAC Opener Against Montreat

MARION, N.C.- The top-ranked baseball team picked up two wins on Thursday. The team swept their Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) opener against the Montreat College Cavaliers 10-0 and 8-1.

Game One:

A sacrifice fly got the Bulldogs on the board in the second inning. The score came on the flyout off Kruise Newman's at-bat, allowing Jack Stevens to run from third to home plate and put TWU on the board. Corbin Shaw followed with a triple that scored Edwin Toribio, giving the team a 2-0 lead at the end of the second inning. 

A pair of home runs in the third extended the lead for the Bulldogs. Devin Dixon hit the first home run, bringing Josh Shelly across home plate with him. Kolton Reynold hit the second of the inning, this time bringing Jonathan Bosque home for a 6-0 lead. Tennessee Wesleyan added a run in the fifth as Bosque scored again on a Newman fielder's choice.

The sixth and seventh inning helped the Bulldogs put the run rule in effect. Daniel Stewart hit a single that brought in Dixon in the six while Reynolds scored on Shaw's fielder's choice and Newman scored on a wild pitch in the seventh, pushing the team ahead by ten runs. The game ended with the team winning 10-0 due to the run rule.

Dixon, Reynolds, Newman, and Shaw all had two RBIs in the win. Justin Jackson struck out ten batters and only allowed three hits in the complete game effort.

Game Two:

Similar to the first game, TWU got on the board in the second inning. This time Toribio hit a single to bring Reynolds home, then later scored on a wild pitch to make the score 2-0. 

The third inning saw each team score a run. Stevens hit a sacrifice fly to bring Shelly home, giving the Bulldogs a 3-1 lead after three innings. A single up the middle by Shaw helped Chris Catalano get to home base in the fourth inning to go along with an RBI single by Toribio that scored Newman. Kurtis Reid also hit a single in the fifth inning that resulted in two RBIs as Catalano and Toribio both scored. The final score read 8-1 after Reynold scored on Newman's RBI single.

Toribio and Reid both had two RBIs in the win. Daniel Batcher pitched five innings to get the win, striking out two batters in the process.

The three-game conference series for the Bulldogs (8-2, 2-0 AAC) against the Cavaliers concludes on Friday with a game at 1:00 p.m.