Penn State Mont Alto baseball players wins Hitter of the Week honors
Penn State Mont Alto’s Brady Bigler (St. Thomas/James Buchanan) was named the Pennsylvania State University Athletic Conference baseball’s hitter of the week Tuesday following a 6-for-9 week at the plate. In game one of the weekend series against Penn State Greater Allegheny, Bigler helped lead a Mont Alto comeback with a triple to lead off the 8th inning, and he recorded the winning hit in the following inning.
In game two, Bigler went 3-for-4, including an RBI double in the second inning. In game three, he walked twice and stole a base while scoring two runs. For the season, Bigler is batting .313 with six doubles, two triples, 22 runs batted in and 17 stolen bases.
Mont Alto’s baseball team will participate in the first round of the 2022 PSUAC Playoffs when they face Penn State Fayette Saturday at 12:30 p.m. The game will be played at Showers Field in DuBois.
Shippensburg University baseball team walks to win over IUP
SHIPPENSBURG – The Shippensburg University baseball team drew back-to-back walks with two outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth Tuesday to win 7-6 against Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Western Division opponent IUP on a rainy day at Fairchild Field.
Shippensburg (22-20) first took the lead off a fourth-inning solo home run from graduate JuJu Cason (East Arcadia, N.C./North Brunswick (Belmont Abbey)). IUP (23-18) answered with a three-run home run in the fifth inning off the bat of Harrison Pontoli.
After another IUP run in the seventh that put the Crimson Hawks up 4-1, the Raiders responded with four runs in the bottom half. Freshman Carter Hinds (Warrington/Central Bucks South) first drove in sophomore Andrew Chronister (Dover/Dover Area) with an RBI triple, and then graduate Jordan Yoder (Ronks/Conestoga Valley (Cecil College/Liberty)) brought Hinds home on a single through the right side. Afterward, Cason hit his second home run of the day, a two-run home run to center field, to give the Raiders a 5-4 lead. It marked Cason’s first multi-home run game of his collegiate career.
The lead was short-lived, as in the top of eighth inning, IUP’s Torrey Roper and Jake Cherry drove in runs to put the Crimson Hawks back on top 6-5.
In the bottom of the ninth inning, sophomore Jafari Williams (Jersey City, N.J./James J. Ferris) worked a walk on a full count and then stole second. Cason and senior Ben Werkheiser (Doylestown/Germantown Academy (Delaware)) both walked on 3-1 counts to load the bases.
With two outs, Justin Darden fouled off the first pitch and then drew four straight balls to draw the walk and tie the game and bring redshirt-sophomore Justin Byler (Lititz/Warwick (Delaware/Louisburg)) to the plate. Byler faced three straight balls, took a strike, and then fouled off a pitch to make the count full at 3-2. On the payoff pitch Byler took the pitch low in the dirt for ball four, which brought Cason home for the walk-off victory. Werkheiser, Darden and Byler all drew their walks with two outs.
Sophomore Kaleb Sophy (Orwigsbur./Blue Mountain) got the start for Shippensburg and went five innings, giving up three runs on two hits and struck out three. He did not allow a hit through the first four innings of the game.
Sophomore Ethan Miller (Greencastl/Greencastle-Antrim), redshirt freshman Cameron Goble (Pittsburgh/Moon Township (VCU)), sophomore Austen Labarre (Nazareth/Pen Argyl) and sophomore Jackson LoBianco (Irvine, Cal./University) (the winning pitcher) all pitched in relief. They combined to allow three runs on two hits and struck out three.
Shippensburg will start a three-game series with PSAC Eastern Division opponent Mansfield at 2 p.m. Friday in Corning, N.Y.
Shippensburg University softball team ranked third in Atlantic Region
SHIPPENSBURG —The Shippensburg University softball team is ranked at No. 3 in the second edition of the 2022 NCAA Atlantic Region rankings released Wednesday. The NCAA regional rankings are annually used to determine the teams that qualify for the NCAA Division II Softball Championships.
This is the second of three editions of the regional rankings before the announcement of the tournament field, which is set for 10 a.m. on May 9. Each set of rankings includes all games played through the previous Sunday.
Eight teams from each of the eight regions will advance to the 2022 NCAA Division II Softball Championships following the completion of the regular season. Per the NCAA, four teams will participate at each of 16 regional sites in a double-elimination tournament. The 16 teams advancing from regional competition will participate in a two-team, best-of-three super regional at eight sites.
