The Dominican University baseball team snapped a seven-game losing streak with a 14-3 win over the Aurora University Spartans in game one of a Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference (NACC) doubleheader before dropping the nightcap, 6-0. The split pushes the Stars to 10-12 on the season and 1-7 in league play.
A day after managing just eight hits in a doubleheader loss on Tuesday, the Stars pounded out 19 hits on Wednesday against the Spartans, including three home runs in the game one victory.
"Today's doubleheader was a step in the right direction with a split against a good team," said Dominican's head coach Steve Hardman, "but we are in the unfortunate position where we no longer can afford splits. My hope is that the team that came out in the first game shows up for the reminder of the season. We showed that our struggles have not been physical, rather, we are lacking the focus and determination it takes to be a good team."
After four games in two days, the Stars will enjoy a back-to-back off days on Thursday and Friday before returning to NACC play on Saturday when the Edgewood College Eagles visit Dominican at Schaumburg Boomers Stadium for a noon doubleheader.
Game One: Dominican 14, Aurora 3 (8 Inn.)
The Stars collected 15 hits, seven for extra bases, to roll past the Spartans, 14-3.
Matt Segovia,
Mike Buckley and
Joe Kukla all went deep for Dominican. Segovia's blast opened the day's scoring, a solo shot in the top of the second, while Buckley belted a two-run homer as part of a five-run fifth. Kukla's long ball came in the seventh, as the Stars scored ten unanswered runs to put the game away.
Tyler Brown picked up the win on the mound for Dominican, surrendering three runs on four hits and six walks while striking out six over seven innings of work.
Noah Loeffler then came on to work a perfect eighth.
Kukla and Segovia finished with three hits apiece while
Colin Janison picked up two hits and drove in four runs.
Game Two: Aurora 6, Dominican 0
The Stars bats went cold in game two, managing just three hits off of Aurora's Will King who improved to 3-0 on the season, going six innings. The Spartans' Chris Roycroft then worked the final three innings, allowing just one hit and one walk to pick up his sixth save of the season.
For Dominican,
Medin Milla gave up four runs on seven hits and two walks in six innings, taking the loss to fall to 0-2 on the season. Milla posted zeros for the first four innings before Aurora finally broke through for two runs in the fifth and one more in each of the sixth and seventh innings.
Mike Piotrowski went 2-for-3 for Dominican, including a two-out double off the top of the wall in the top of the second. Janison and Segovia added a hit apiece in the losing effort.
