Big offensive innings result in opening doubleheader sweep for Pride over Mustangs

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - Beginning a matchup between the top two Heart of America Athletic Conference North teams by conference record on Saturday, the Clarke University baseball team earned 7-3 and 13-7 wins over Mount Mercy University on the road to begin their four-game series in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Entering the series with just a combined five losses in conference play, only one of those losses being on the record of the Mustangs, CU was able to close the gap in the standings to just a single game with their two wins as their 20 runs were scored in just five different innings, scoring at least two runs in each of those innings and five or more three times.

In the opener, the Pride were able to jump out to a 2-0 lead behind a Darin Eales sacrifice fly then a Jordan Breen single followed by an error to score both Omari Barksdale and Brady Lord who started the inning with back-to-back singles before Barksdale stole third to set up the sac fly.

The home team quickly answered back in each of the bottom of the next three innings off of Clarke starting pitcher Kevin Toala to take a 3-2 lead after three innings, but those three runs were the only scoring damage against the right-hander as he finished his second-straight complete game win with a final line of three earned runs on eight hits with two walks and one strikeout to move his record to 5-3 on the season.

Facing their first deficit of the game, CU was able to put up a five-run fourth inning by getting RBIs from Alex Cashman, Barksdale, Lord, and Eales with Cashman singling to tie the game at 3-3, Nico Reed singling and Cole Swartz scoring on a throwing error, Barksdale this time delivering a sac fly, Lord tripling home Reed, and Eales singling home Lord to make it a 7-3 game, where it would end four innings later.

Onto game two, big offensive innings told the story once again with the Pride jumping out in front with a two-run inning, this time in the second when Jaxon Brooks and Reed each drove in runs with a single and sac fly respectively before the Mustangs produced a six-run bottom of the third to take a four-run lead.

That lead held all the way to the top of the fifth before Clarke finally answered with a six-run inning of their own with at bats from Eales, Breen, Ethan Hefel, and Swartz all resulting in runs with a throwing error by Mount Mercy and a wild pitch helping result in five of the six runs during the inning.

The Mustangs were able to get a run back in the bottom of the sixth to make it a one-run game at 8-7 in favor of CU, but in the top of the seventh the Pride were able to add on valuable insurance runs with another five-run inning that had Swartz and Reed deliver RBI singles again before Barksdale produced a bases clearing triple with the bases loaded to make it a six-run advantage heading into the bottom of the seventh.

Having entered the game at the start of the fourth inning, Travis Gibson took to the mound in the seventh only allowing the earned run in the sixth that made it 8-7 on three hits as he pitched around a pair of hits in the seventh to keep the score at 13-7 to pick up his third win of the season to finish with a four-inning line of one run on five hits with a strikeout and no walks.

Over the entirety of the doubleheader, Swartz finished with four hits, two runs, and a pair of RBIs in game two, Breen had a similar offensive day with four hits and a pair of runs scored in the finale, Brooks went 2-for-3 with an RBI and two runs in his lone start in game two with Barksdale finishing with four runs driven in over the two games, and Eales finishing at three combined RBIs.

The Pride and Mustangs will wrap up their four-game series in Cedar Rapids on Sunday with a chance for CU to overtake the lead in the Heart North with another doubleheader sweep to produce the full series sweep when MMU's senior day games are set to begin at 1:00 p.m. CT.