The 'Cats earned a comfortable win today to start the second weekend of the season.
College baseball season is in full swing, as this year's Northwestern Wildcats began their second weekend of games today against Cornell. The 'Cats won today's contest 13-5, to bring their record back to .500 after a 1-2 opening weekend against Rice.
Northwestern's offense was clicking from the first inning, when Owen McElfatrick drove in Jack Lausch on a single to center. Cornell struck back in the bottom of the inning to tie the score, but the 'Cats were right back at it in the next frame.
Both Jack's, Counsell and Lausch, hit sacrifice flies in the second to make the score 3-1. From there, Cornell never was able to even the score, as the Wildcats tee'd off on starting pitcher Carson Mayfield. He was tagged for seven total earned runs by the time he was removed from the game in the fourth inning.
The 'Cats did most of their damage today getting guys on and driving them in, not with the long ball. But designated hitter Nick Barron crushed his first bomb in a Northwestern uniform in the top of the third, driving in McElfatrick.
Otherwise, Lausch was a big contributor, driving in two runners on the day. As was catcher Jay Slater, who did the same.
On the bump, the 'Cats started Sam Hliboki, who managed five innings of four-run baseball. It wasn't his best effort, but it was enough to record a win on the stat sheet. He finished the day with six strikeouts and six hits allowed on 80 total pitches. That's a pretty typical leash early in the season from Wildcat head coach Ben Greenspan.
After Hliboki, Northwestern brought in Alex Grant to pitch the sixth inning. He allowed a run, but by that point the 'Cats were far enough ahead that it didn't really matter.
Greenspan took Grant out after that inning in favor of Tommy Bridges, who was the team's most impressive pitcher today. Bridges went three scoreless innings to shut the door on Cornell, striking out four, walking two and allowing just one hit.
In a tighter game, those walks could have been a larger issue. But they didn't yield any runs, as Bridges did a good job pitching out of situations with runners on base.
Northwestern will be back in action tomorrow at 11 a.m. against Cornell once again. It's playing a double-header, but its second opponent at 3 p.m. is Boston College, which it will match up with again on Sunday.
Next weekend, the 'Cats get a traditional three-game set at Georgia Tech, continuing non conference play.