Baseball Completes Sweep of DWU Behind Strong Pitching

Doane Baseball completed the opening week sweep of GPAC play on Tuesday with a pair of wins over Dakota Wesleyan, 2-0 and 11-1. The victories moved Doane to 18-4 on the season and 4-0 in the GPAC.

In the first game of the day, pitchers took center stage as Doane's Kaden Crawford faced off against Dakota Wesleyan's Seth Christiansen. Crawford threw five scoreless innings, allowing one hit. Christiansen went four scoreless before Doane pushed a run across the plate in the fifth.

Brett Meyer led off the fifth inning with a single. He followed with a stolen base and with the pitch going to the backstop, he advanced to third. Joe Osborn delivered an RBI-single to give Doane the lead.

In the sixth inning, Doane added a run as Meyer hit a bloop single to plate Nate Mensik for a two-run lead. Kyler Beekman shut the door on DWU to record his fourth save. Crawford improved to 3-2 on the year. The duo combined to limit Dakota Wesleyan to a pair of hits, one walk, and six strikeouts.

Meyer recorded two of the team's four hits and had a hand in both runs, scoring one and driving in one.

In the second game, Doane scored in every inning except the fourth. The Tigers put their first three batters on base with Lukas White hitting a single to drive in Meyer. In the second inning, Meyer delivered a two-run single to give Doane a 3-0 lead.

Dakota Wesleyan scored their lone run in the top of the third on a Daulton Wilcoxen RBI-double, their first hit of the game. Doane came back with a run in the bottom of the inning as Justin Nevells scored on a double play.

Doane broke the game open in the fifth inning as Luke LaChance had a two-run double and scored on a Logan Amick double. In the sixth inning, Doane added four runs on six walks and one DWU error.

Holden Craig picked up the win for Doane as he went 3.0 innings while working on a pitch count. He allowed one run on one hit and four walks while striking out five. Jake Johnson threw 2.0 scoreless innings, allowing one hit and striking out two. Hyunjun Chung threw the final 2.0 innings, allowing two hits. For the game, Tiger pitching held DWU to four hits and four walks while striking out seven.

Doane took full advantage of free bases in the game, drawing 13 walks and one hit batter as they were limited to six hits. LaChance was 1-for-1 with two runs scored and two driven in. Ben Grigsby was 1-for-2 with an RBI and his courtesy runner, Tanner Black, scored three runs. Meyer was 1-for-2 with a run scored and two driven in.

Next up for Doane will be a four-game series at Morningside. Games are scheduled in Sioux City for March 25-26.