No. 1 Baseball Scores 37 Runs in Doubleheader Sweep of CIU

ATHENS, Tenn.- The baseball team added two more wins to their record on Saturday. The No. 1 ranked Bulldogs completed the Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) against Columbia International University with 12-1 and 25-0 wins.

Game One:

A solo home run in the the bottom of the second by Kolton Reynolds put the game in a 1-1 tie. In the third inning, Josh Shelly brought in a run with his double to give TWU the lead when Cody McGill scored from second base. The fifth inning saw the Bulldogs score five more runs.

With two runners on base, Shelly hit a single that Nick Colling would score on. Devin Dixon followed with a single that brought McGill in for his second run of the game while Daniel Stewart hit a sacrifice fly that Shelly scored on to make the lead 5-1. Edwin Toribio grew the lead to 7-1 when his single brought in Reynolds and Dixon.

In the sixth inning, a bases loaded walk by Newman moved everyone forward a base, putting Dixon on the scoreboard as a run. Toribio brought in another two runs in the next at-bat with his single scoring both Reynolds and Jack Stevens. Toribio brought the game to a close in the eight inning when his two-run home run, which also brought in Jordan Massis, put the team ahead by more than ten runs to incur the run rule in a 12-1 win.

Toribio led the offense with six RBIs. Daniel Batcher had four strikeouts in the pitching win.

Game Two:

TWU got off to a quick start in the second game of the doubleheader, scoring 10 runs in the first inning. Stewart started the scoring with a three-run home run while Chris Catalano brought in a run with a single. Toribio scored on a balk while Catalano became the sixth run of the inning on a wild pitch. Stewart recorded his fourth RBI of the inning when his single scored Corbin Shaw. Reynolds hit a single that resulted in two RBIs when Jonathan Bosque and Shelly both scored. Stewart scored the 10th run of the inning on Toribio's RBI-single to give the Bulldogs a commanding 10-0 lead. 

Shaw started off the second inning with a solo home run as a part of a five-run inning for Tennessee Wesleyan. Stewart recorded his fifth and sixth RBI of the gmae with a single while Reynolds hit a two-run homer to move the team's lead to 15-0 after two innings.

In the third inning, McGill hit a double that brought in Catalano and Hagen Escoto hit a single that scored McGill, moving the lead to 17-0. In the fourth inning, a three-run bomb by Shaw made the score 20-0. 

The final five runs of the 25-run game occurred in the fifth inning. After a sacrifice fly by Toribio gave Escoto the space to score, the bases became loaded after a Catalano walk. Shaw unloaded them with a grand slame, pushing the team to their 25-run margin in the doubleheader sweep.

Shaw finished the game with three home runs and eight RBIs. Blake Peyton had three strikeouts in the pitching win.

Up next for the Bulldogs (12-3, 5-1 AAC) is a home showdown against No. 5 University of the Cumberlands on Tuesday. The game is set to begin at 2:00 p.m.