NILES, Ohio – Racking up a season-high 21 hits, the Youngstown State Penguins defeated the Oakland Golden Grizzlies, 18-3, on Thursday, March 16 at Eastwood Field in the first Horizon League game of the 2023 season for both programs.
Thursday was also the home opener for the Penguins, who improve to 4-13, while Oakland drops to 5-10.
Falling to 1-1, redshirt senior right-hander
Bryce Konitzer took the loss for the Golden Grizzlies. Making his fourth start of the year, he went four innings, allowing six runs on 11 hits with a walk and three strikeouts, throwing 94 pitches.
Fellow redshirt senior righty
Brett Hagen worked the fifth through seventh and freshmen
Rhys Francis and
Tanner Ware and another redshirt senior,
Caleb Fuller, combined to complete the eighth.
6-foot-7 Oil City, Pennsylvania fifth-year senior Travis Perry earned the win for Youngstown State, his second of the campaign. Throwing 6.2 innings, he gave up just one run on three hits with three walks and sent down six on strikes.
Courtesy of a sacrifice fly by fifth-year senior first baseman Steve D'Eusanio, the Penguins led 1-0 after one inning of play and added three more runs to up their margin to four in the second by stringing together five consecutive two-out singles.
Oakland's first run came run in the fourth, when redshirt sophomore center fielder
Drew Collins tagged and scored on a sacrifice fly by redshirt senior shortstop
Thomas Green, making the score 4-1 and giving Green his team-leading 10
th RBI.
Part of a three-hit, six-RBI day, senior Braeden O'Shaughnessy stretched the Youngstown State lead back out to 10-1 in the seventh with a grand slam to left, his third home run of the season.
Redshirt senior third baseman
Luke Malmanger singled home senior left fielder
Ian Cleary for the Golden Grizzlies' second run of the evening in the eighth, but the Penguins responded with a snowman in the bottom of the frame, giving themselves an 18-2 advantage.
Tying Green at 10 RBI, graduate student first baseman
Jared Miller recorded a sacrifice fly for the game's final run in the ninth, which scored freshman
Reggie Bussey who pinch-hit for junior catcher
Brandon Heidal.
STATISTICAL NOTES
- Green extended his hit streak to a club-best four games with an eighth-inning single
- Konitzer's three strikeouts give him 12 this season, making him the sixth Oakland pitcher in double-digits
UP NEXT
The middle game of this three-game set to open Horizon League play, the Golden Grizzlies and Youngstown State will square off again on Friday, March 17 at 3 p.m.
Sophomore right-hander
Hunter Pidek (0-0, 3.00 ERA, 12 IP) will start for Oakland, while junior righty Nick Perez (0-2, 10.00 ERA, 18 IP) will go for the Penguins.
With winter weather and cold temperatures representing a relatively consistent threat to many early-season games in the Midwest, keep an eye on goldengrizzlies.com and @OaklandBSB on Twitter for news about any possible scheduling updates.
