Week two of conference play is in the books and the Necks are making some noise. We gave South Dakota State a couple of gifts last weekend, which hurt, but we had no time think about what could have been with Oral Roberts coming to town.
Game one versus the Golden Eagles was crazy. We took a 3-2 lead going into the bottom of the 7th when a huge storm hit. It came in so quickly that we struggled to get the tarp on with no help from ORU. It was raining, hailing, and the tarp was tossing people around because of how windy it got. We resumed play after the storm passed and the field got fixed up. ORU scored 3 runs in the top of the eighth, but the game was stopped in the bottom of the 8th (Bases loaded, 1 out) due to darkness after ORU made a pitching change at 7:20PM. According to Summit League rules an unfinished game reverts back to the last completed inning, which was the 7th. Therefore, the Leathernecks took game one 3-2. Maybe ORU should have helped out if they wanted to get the game in before it got too dark.
To say the least, they weren’t too happy with the results of game one and wouldn’t feel any better about game two. We came out ready to prove game one wasn’t a fluke and dominated. The final score was 13-5. The next two games turned out to be battles as ORU took the final two games 5-2 (in extras) and 5-1 (1-1 till the eighth).
Getting SDSU and ORU the first two weekends of conference was a tough task, but coming out 3-5 isn’t too bad, and it should have been a lot better than that. We need to close out some games better and we will be a tough team to beat. ORU and SDSU know we are for real, now we just need to take care of business this week against Iowa and Oakland and continue to progress.
“I only eat cereal that turns my milk purple”
Bryan Jordan
