WINONA, Minn. – The St. Olaf College baseball team began its defense of its Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) regular-season title by sweeping Saint Mary’s University with 5-3 and 8-2 victories on Friday afternoon at Max Molock Field.
St. Olaf (11-5, 2-0 MIAC) began MIAC play with a sweep for the third season in a row with the back-to-back victories over Saint Mary’s (11-10, 2-2 MIAC). The Oles played as the home team after the games were originally scheduled for Mark Almli Field but had to be relocated to Saint Mary’s home field due to field conditions in Northfield.
St. Olaf will head to CHS Field in St. Paul to face Hamline University in a doubleheader starting at 1 p.m. on Sunday, April 6.
St. Olaf 5, Saint Mary’s 3 | Box Score
After giving up three runs in the top of the third, St. Olaf four runs in the bottom of the inning and once in the fourth while holding Saint Mary’s scoreless the rest of the way to take the opener. Junior Christopher Woodside led four Oles with multi-hit games by going 3-for-3 with two doubles, two runs scored, and one RBI.
Senior Evan Hammonds, junior Mason Buck, and senior Matthew Kulesa added two hits apiece, with Hammonds and Buck each driving in a run and Kulesa scoring once. Senior Jacob Fickenscher moved to 4-1 on the season after allowing three runs over the first 4.0 innings before sophomore Kieran Haaland tossed 3.0 shutout innings to earn his first save of the season. Haaland scattered three hits with no walks and one strikeout.
Saint Mary’s got on the board first with three runs in the top of the third, but St. Olaf quickly responded with four runs in the bottom of the frame. After sophomore Cole Pleimann led off with a single, Woodside and junior Brendan Goldman hit back-to-back RBI doubles to make it a one-run game. Two batters later, Buck tied the game with a sacrifice fly to deep center that scored Goldman.
Kulesa kept the inning alive with a single and the next two batters reached on a hit-by-pitch and a walk to load the bases. After a pitching change, junior Frank Lavin greeted reliever Tyson Allen-Woodcock with a line-drive single to left to plate the eventual game-winning run. Hammonds added a run-scoring single in the fourth after Woodside doubled and moved up to third on a ground out by Goldman.
Saint Mary’s got a two-out single in each inning off of Haaland but could not advance the runners any further. Haaland’s save was the third of his career after he picked up two as a first year last season.
St. Olaf 8, Saint Mary’s 2 | Box Score
St. Olaf broke a 1-1 tie with a five-run bottom of the fourth and got a strong start from senior Matthew Oberlander to complete the sweep. Oberlander claimed his second win of the season after holding Saint Mary’s to two runs on five hits with one walk and four strikeouts over 5.2 innings of work.
Sophomores Carter Follman and Nick Levasseur combined for 3.1 innings of shutout relief for the Oles. Follman did not allow a hit in his 1.1 innings on the mound before Levasseur scattered three hits and a walk with a pair of strikeouts over his 2.0 innings.
Eight Oles registered at least one hit in the win, led by sophomore Cole Pleimann, who was 3-for-4 with a stolen base, two runs scored, and three RBI. Buck was the only other St. Olaf hitter with multiple hits, as he went 2-for-5 with a stolen base and a run scored.
St. Olaf manufactured a run in the bottom of the first when Buck singled with one out, stole second, got to third on a ground out, and scored on a balk. Saint Mary’s responded with a leadoff home run in the second to quickly tie the game.
In the fourth, the Oles got their bats going with five runs on seven hits. Senior Jack Alley and Lavin started the inning with a double and a single before Lavin stole second to put two runners in scoring position for Pleimann, who singled to right center to score both runners. Later in the inning, St. Olaf added runs on a ground out by Goldman, an infield hit by Hammonds, and a fielder’s choice off the bat of Kulesa.
The Cardinals took advantage of a leadoff double to score their second run in the top of the sixth, but the Oles’ bullpen shut out the hosts from that point on. St. Olaf scored a pair of insurance runs in the bottom of the seventh, as Pleimann drove in a run with a two-out single, stole second, and scored on a bloop double by junior Henry Black.
