South Dakota State baseball took three victories in its last four games, defeating the University of St. Thomas twice in three games and Midland University once this past week.
St. Thomas Tommies
A sacrifice fly RBI started the scoring early for the Tommies. They held the lead until the third inning, when an SDSU fielder’s choice and a sacrifice fly put the Jacks ahead. A pair of RBI singles in the fifth inning extended the lead before the Tommies hit a solo home run in the sixth. SDSU scored three runs in the seventh inning to take game one of the doubleheader, 7-2.
Sam Schlecht started on the mound for SDSU, pitching five and two-thirds innings with six strikeouts. Tristan Augedahl filled in and struck out three more batters.
The Tommies opened the scoring again in game two with a homer in the fourth inning. The Jacks could only produce one run with a Nolan Grawe RBI single. An RBI double, home run, and RBI single capped off scoring in the Tommies’ favor, 4-1.
Sam Novtony pitched for the first six and one-third innings, earning five strikeouts. Ty Madison relieved for the last one and two-thirds innings and earned another SDSU strikeout.
Game three saw the Jacks’ offense dominate. Luke Wroblewski opened the scoring with a home run in the first inning and an RBI single in the second. Luke Jones hit an RBI single in the third inning.
A hit by pitch allowed a bases-loaded walk in the fourth, followed by a Nic Werk 3 RBI double. He would score on a wild pitch later in the inning. SDSU’s lead was 9-0 entering the fifth inning, which extended with four runs over the next two innings. The Tommies scored two runs in the seventh inning but could not draw closer to the Jacks in the 13-2 win.
Kaden Rylance struck out five batters in the first six innings. Dylan Richardson finished the game in the last inning with another strikeout.
Midland Warriors
The Jacks put up another good offensive performance Tuesday against Midland.
SDSU scored four runs, including a home run by Grawe, before the Warriors were able to score in the sixth inning. They managed to cut the deficit to one run, trailing 4-3, but the Jacks would score nine more runs in the next two innings to take the win, 13-3.
Six pitchers played for the Jacks, with Trey Husar getting the starting nod. He pitched for two innings with four batters struck out. Jacob Sjuts recorded his first save of the season.
SDSU moves to 12-21 overall with a 6-6 Summit League conference record, ranked third.
Oral Roberts Golden Eagles
SDSU continues its homestead with a three-game series against Oral Roberts. The Golden Eagles are 11-1 in conference play and ranked first in the Summit League.
Batting .318 this season, Makani Tanaka leads the starters with 25 RBIs and five home runs. The senior outfielder from Honolulu, Hawai’i, has had two games with three runs batted in, doing so in games against the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and Oklahoma State University.
Tanaka has also hit 2 RBIs in four other games this season.
On the mound, Easton Teel leads the starting pitchers with an earned run average of 2.11, giving up just 11 earned runs in 47 innings played across his eight starts. Jackson Farrell owns the team’s lowest earned run average at .61, with one run in 14 and two-thirds innings pitched.
First pitch for game one is Friday at 3 p.m. Game two is scheduled for Saturday at 2 p.m., and game three will start on Sunday at 1 p.m.
