Statesmen Fall Twice in KC

Kansas City, Mo.--The William Penn baseball team could not find enough firepower as it opened its Kansas City trip with a pair of losses Saturday.

WPU (6-3) lost to Tabor 6-3 and Doane 8-2.

Tabor 6, WPU 3

The Bluejays got out to an early 2-0 lead after two innings, but Nick George (Jr., Sarnia, Ontario, Sociology) was able to limit the scoring through the next two frames. In the bottom of the fourt,h the navy and gold finally had an answer as Trevor Dooley (Jr., Prole, Iowa, Industrial Technology) reached on a fielder's choice, scoring Leland Riley II (Fr., Victorville, Calif., Kinesiology). A batter later, Blair Speas (So., O'Fallon, Mo., Undecided) delivered an RBI single to even the score at 2-2.

Tabor bounced back with three more runs in the top half of the fifth to chase George, but WPU got one back quickly with a Justin Martinez (Sr., Bronx, N.Y., Sports Management) single that brought Tim Jean (Sr., Libertyville, Ill., Public Accounting) around to score. Unfortunately, that would be the last run the Statemen would scratch across, while Tabor scored once more in the sixth inning.

Riley II was the lone Statesmen to deliver two hits in the contest, as multiple other players had one in the contest.

George worked five innings in the loss, while Bret Whiffen (Jr., Green Bay, Wis., Exercise Science) came on in relief and gave up one earned run in seven batters faced.

Doane 8, WPU 2

Unfortunately, Doane got on the board first, scoring three runs in the bottom half of the first inning. The deficit did not last long for WPU as back-to-back singles from Riley II and George set up a Nathan Jessell (Sr., Napa, Calif., Sociology) RBI single that scored Riley II. Martinez then grounded out to second, but it was enough to bring George in from third.

The tigers quickly responded in the second inning putting up another three spots to pull out to a 6-2 advantage. The Statesmen could not muster any more offense unfortunately, while the Tigers tacked on two more tallies.

Stetson Denning (Sr., Queen Creek, Ariz., Sports Management) struck out three in three innings to take the loss.  Matt Shover (Grad., Barry, Ill., Master's of Sports Management) took over in the fourth inning and struck out two while not allowing a walk.

"Our pitchers had trouble getting ahead in both games, while our hitters were overmatched most of the day," Head Coach Mike Laird said. "One big error in the Tabor game cost us three unearned runs in the loss. Our execution has to be better on Monday."

Next Up: The Statesmen will remain in Kansas City Monday as they take on Saint Mary (Kan.) and Kansas Christian at 11 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., respectively.