SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – [BOX SCORE] Missouri Baptist utilized a four-run fourth and shut-down pitching on Friday to earn a 5-0 win over Benedictine University – Springfield in the second round of the 2014 American Midwest Conference Baseball Tournament.
Missouri Baptist (44-10, 22-5 AMC) sent Dave Mullins to the mound on Friday and the Spartan lefty had a tremendous start. Mullins tossed seven full innings and allowed eight hits and no runs to earn his seventh win of the season.
Chris Cordova combined with Mullins to grab the shutout and send Missouri Baptist to the semifinals of the tournament. Cordova tossed two innings and was brilliant in relief. He allowed just two hits and struck-out two in the outing.
Missouri Baptist and Benedictine-Springfield were scoreless until the third inning when the Spartans got their offense going. After two consecutive walks issued by Connor Jacobs, the Bulldogs looked like they could get out of the inning. MBU grounded into consecutive fielder's choice's, which resulted in the force-out of the lead runner at third.
With two outs, Josh Fuentes laced a base hit through the hole at shortstop to give the Spartans a one-run lead. MBU continued to cash-in as Orlando Olivera singled to score the second run to extend the lead. Then, after grabbing the 2-0 advantage, Eli Roundtree doubled to deep right field, which scored two, and MBU led 4-0 as the inning concluded.
Orlando Olivera struck again in the top of the sixth. The Spartan left fielder crushed a 3-0 pitch nearly 400 feet, well over the left field wall, to give Missouri Baptist a 5-0 lead on his 10th home run of the year.
Missouri Baptist held the lead at that point as Mullins and Cordova were simply great. Mullins finished the day with seven strikeouts as he gets the win and leads his team to the semifinals.
Missouri Baptist nearly put another big inning into motion in the top of the ninth. Jordan Cawthon came-on in relief and failed to get anything going. After the Bulldog hurler hit two batsmen and walked one, the Spartans had the bases loaded with one out.
After one pitch thrown to Trevin Craig was made, Coach Steve Torricelli went to his bullpen yet again and called Drake Curry into action. Curry got both Craig and Fuentes to fly out and ended the threat.
With the win, Missouri Baptist will now advance to the AMC Baseball Tournament semifinals, where the team will take-on the winner of the game between William Woods and Lyon College, set for the final game on Friday. Coverage will begin just before first pitch at Robin Roberts Stadium on both the AMC Sports Network and the Spartan Digital Network. A link to the game can be found on mbuspartans.com.
GAME NOTES
Josh Fuentes extended his hitting streak to 12 games with hits in the first and third innings… Orlando Olivera hit his team-leading 10th homerun on the year in the sixth inning… Since losing to Benedictine-Springfield in the AMC Tournament in 2013, Missouri Baptist has won five-straight against the Bulldogs… Benedictine-Springfield out-hit Missouri Baptist in the game, but could not manage a run in the game.
