FORT MYERS, Fla. – Carroll University rallied late to force extra innings and scored in the bottom of the 10th inning to defeat the Lakeland University baseball team 4-3 Friday in the Gene Cusic Collegiate Classic.
The Muskies rallied from a 1-0 deficit only to see the Pioneers one-up them with a rally of their own. Carroll scored in the bottom of the ninth to tie it and then scored the winning run in extra innings to drop Lakeland to 2-5 on the season.
The Muskies also found out after the game the news that the Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference had come to the decision to cancel all remaining athletic competition for the remainder of the 2019-20 academic year. Lakeland will conclude its spring break trip Saturday when it faces Skidmore (N.Y.) College at 8 a.m. Central (9 a.m. Eastern) in what will be the final Muskies athletic event of the semester.
The teams engaged in a pitcher's duel most of the way as the game stayed scoreless until the bottom of the fourth inning when Carroll's Justin Baker doubled in a run. The score remained 1-0 until the sixth, when
Hunter Garling (
So.-Perkins, Mich.) reached on an error that allowed
Hunter Frisk (
So.-Manteca, Calif.) to score and tie the game at one.
The Muskies took their first lead of the game in the eighth, when a single from Garling scored
Trevor Meier (
Sr.-Columbus, Mont.) and
Tyler LaMack (
Fr.-Pewaukee, Wis.) to give the Muskies their first lead of the game at 3-1. Carroll responded in their half of the eighth with a run and then scored on a wild pitch in the ninth inning to tie the game at three after nine innings. The Muskies came up scoreless in the tenth, and an RBI single from Evan Henry clinched victory for the Pioneers.
Nathan Hemmerling (
So.-Riverside, Calif.) pitched eight innings and allowed eight hits with two runs (one earned) with 13 strikeouts and two walks.
Mason Pechy (
Sr.-Diamond Bar, Calif.) came on in relief in the ninth and allowed four hits and two runs in taking the loss in 1 2/3 innings of work.
Garling reached three times with a single and two walks in th finished as the only Muskie to bring in a run as he had two RBIs on one hit and two walks in three at-bats. Hemmerling helped his own cause on the mound by going 1-for-4 with a double. Meier and LaMack each added two hits each.
