CLEARWATER, Fla. - The Saginaw Valley State University baseball team finished its annual spring trip to Florida on Saturday (Mar. 8) with a pair of games against the Ohio Valley Fighting Scots. With an opportunity to return home with a .500 record, the Cardinals couldn't come up with a victory and fell twice by scores of 1-0 and 5-1, respectively.
Game One
The day's opening game moved along quick, as both pitchers kept the opponents' offense in-check. The first and only run of the game came in the top of the sixth inning when a Scot runner stole third and scored on a throwing error.
Saginaw Valley failed to score in its final two at-bats after that and Ohio Valley sealed the 1-0 victory.
Sophomore Dylan Wisniewski turned in a stellar performance on the mound for the Cards. He pitched all seven innings, scattering seven hits while striking-out eight. The only run that Wisniewski allowed was unearned.
Junior Chris Perkovich led the offense with two hits in the opener and sophomore Tyler Schwanz walked twice.
Game Two
The second contest started similar to the first until OVU would plate a pair of runs in the bottom of the third and another in its half of the fourth to take a 3-0 advantage.
In the top of the sixth, junior Austin Nogiec had an RBI groundout to score freshman Connor Foley and cut the deficit to 3-1.
The Scots would respond with two more in the bottom of the inning, however, and make the lead 5-1.
After SV had a couple of hits by Perkovich and junior Kyle Kaufmann with one out, it couldn't push any more runs across the plate and fell in the second game by the score of 5-1.
Junior Andrew Geese suffered the loss on the bump as he worked five innings, giving up three runs and striking-out six.
Foley joined Perkovich and Kaufman as the only players to record a hit for the Cardinals in the game.
The Cardinals finish their trip with a 3-7 record and will return north to complete the remainder of their spring schedule. SVSU is set to host Northwood University on Wednesday, March 19th in both teams' GLIAC openers.
