Indians win 10th straight with sweep over Luna CC
The McCook Community College baseball team won its 10th straight game Friday sweeping Luna Community College in a home doubleheader winning 1-0 in seven innings and 10-7 in nine innings on a windy, cold day at the Jaycees Sports Complex.
“It wasn’t ideal to play today but to get two wins coming out of the day we will take,” said MCC Coach Jon Olsen.
In Game 1, sophomore Connor Charvat (Elkhorn South H.S.) blasted a solo home run in the third inning for the only run of the game as sophomore Tait Anderson (Auckland, New Zealand) tossed a four-hitter for his league-leading eighth win of the season.
“You don’t see many 1-0 games out there in any level and it’s been a while since I’ve seen one,” said Olsen. “It was fun to watch Tait go today, he was really good, and we did just enough at the plate for the win.”
Trailing 2-1 in Game 2, the Indians got the offense going in the fourth inning to take a 5-2 lead with a pair of two-run homeruns from Corbin Lochhead (Vegreville, Alberta) and Owen Weales (Bowmanville, Ontario) as MCC held on to register their eighth straight win in Region IX and take a one game lead in the standings over Northeastern Junior College.
“We need to do a better job tomorrow, should be a nicer day tomorrow, hopefully we clean up some things at the plate,” said Olsen. “But on the flip side I felt like we competed on the mound, and for the conditions, I felt like we hung in there defensively.”
The Roughriders fall to 11-31 overall and 5-13 in the standings.
The Indians improve to 34-9 and 15-3 in the standings – one game in front of Northeastern Junior College, who will start a four-game series Saturday against Otero College in La Junta, Colo.
MCC and Luna will wrap up their series Saturday with a doubleheader scheduled to start at noon. The Indians are now 17-4 at the Jaycees Sports Complex.
GAME 1 – McCook CC 1, Luna CC 0: Connor Charvat (Omaha) hit a solo home run to lead off the third inning. It was his sixth round-tripper of the season.
“Connor had a huge swing to get one out of the yard into a pretty good wind,” said Olsen.
Tait Anderson allowed one runner in each of the first four innings but finished strong, retiring nine of the final batters he faced. He allowed four singles and a hit batter, with no walks and eight strikeouts. The lefty improves to 8-1 on the season with his fifth complete game.
MCC was held to four hits with Charvat’s home run, doubles by Owen Weales and freshman Kieren Cutler (Paradise, Newfoundland and Labrador) and a single by Kon Yoshimura (Nagasaki, Japan).
GAME 2 – McCook CC 10, Luna CC 7: Owen Weales singled in the first, advanced to third on a single by Tyler Reyburn (sophomore, Frederick, Colo.) and scored on a fielder’s choice by freshman Jakoby Hamer (Edmonton, Alberta).
Luna tied the game in the second with a couple MCC errors with sophomore Raul Romero (Brisbane, Queensland Australia) on the mound. The Roughriders added a run in the third with a single, two walks and a wild pitch then. Romero was relieved with one out and the bases loaded in the fourth inning. He went 3.1 innings, allowing three hits and one earned run on four walks and two strikeouts. Sophomore reliever Tobey Cassino (Arvada, Colo.) got out of the inning by inducing a groundball doubleplay to end the inning.
Kieren Cutler singled to lead off the fourth and Corbin Lochhead homered to right field to put MCC up 3-2. It was Lockhead’s fourth homer of the season. Later in the inning Kon Youshimura singled in front of an Owen Weales home run to give the Indians a 5-2 lead. It was the seventh home run of the year for Weales.
MCC added another run in the fifth when Connon Charvat hit a sacrifice fly to drive in Cutler, who had walked, to put the Indians in front 6-2.
Cassino allowed a run in the sixth, but ended up the pitcher of record and recorded the win (2-0), allowing two hits, one earned run on one walk and four strikeouts.
The Tribe added three runs in the seventh on a walk by Cutler, a Luna error, another walk followed by a hit batter and consecutive RBI-fielder’s choices with Reyburn and Hamer at bat to lead 9-3.
Freshman reliever Nolan Jackson (Grimsby, Ontario) surrendered a solo homer in the eighth and left the game, allowing two hits, one earned run with a walk and a strikeout. Freshman Santiago Rodriguez (Okotoks, Alberta) allowed three straight singles but got out of his bases-loaded jam by striking out the final two batters of the inning to make it a 9-4 MCC lead.
After a leadoff error in the bottom of the inning, Yoshimura delivered a two-out RBI single to put the Indians up 10-4
Luna scored three runs in the ninth, but Rodriguez preserved the win, pitching the final two innings, allowing six hits, three earned runs on a hit batter and two strikeouts.
The Roughriders out-hit MCC 13-7 but made seven errors. Reyburn and Yoshimura both had two-hit games. Weales, Hamer, Charvat and Lochhead all had two RBIs, and Cutler scored four runs.
“I know it was a tough day to get things going offensively but I thought in Game 2 we did not execute very good at all,” said Olsen. “We left way too many baserunners out there and struck out entirely too much.”
The Indians struck out 11 times in the game.
Up-to-date information about MCC baseball including up-to-date schedule and changes, livestream links for home games, rosters, photos, statistics and more can be found on the MCC Athletics website, www.mccindians.com