The Biola Eagles baseball faced a strong Master’s College Mustangs team in a three-game series, one game on Friday followed by a double-header on Saturday. The No. 20 Mustangs ended up too much for the Eagles to handle in all the games — winning 15-5, 5-2 and 3-2 — even though Biola improved massively from the first game on Friday to the last on Saturday.
The first meeting of the two teams did not go well for the Eagles. The Mustangs scored five runs in the first inning alone, setting the tone for the rest of the game. They got another five run inning in the seventh and went on to a dominating 15-5 victory. Steven Karkenny was the star for the Mustangs, getting three RBIs off of two home runs. Jason Karkenny started on the mound for Master’s and pitched five scoreless innings before Hunter Totemeier replaced him, allowing Biola four of its five runs. One bright spot for Biola was freshman Tucie Shelp who got two RBIs as well as a stolen base. After the loss, the Eagles had to decide how to respond and recover.
“When teams face adversity, it can go one of two ways”, said Groeschell. “You can either start to make excuses, blame other people, and lose hope, or you can band together, learn from your mistakes and take responsibility for your actions. As a captain, I take much of the blame. We weren’t prepared mentally. There are no excuses. But we will get better, we will learn and we will improve.”
WORKING AS A TEAM
Improve they did, as the team Biola fielded on Saturday played drastically different from the one that showed up Friday. They were not able to pull out a victory in either of the games, but kept the score much closer and even led for a few innings in the third and final game.
Master’s got five runs in the first three innings of the first game on Saturday, and looked to get another big game. The Eagles were able to shut them down after the third inning, but could not come up with the offensive plays to pull out the win. Junior Julian Jarrard and sophomore Jeremy Barth both got an RBI for the Eagles, which unfortunately was not enough to overcome the Mustang’s who went on to win 5-2.
The final game of the series ended in a heartbreaking 3-2 loss for the Eagles, playing solidly the whole game and even took the lead in the fifth inning. Great pitching by freshman Micah Beyer became the key to Biola’s defensive effort by only allowing three hits and one run in his 4.2 innings pitched. On the offensive side, Jarrard came up big again, getting a third inning single to bring home senior Tanner Swire. Freshman Rawley Hughes also got an RBI, as he was hit by a pitch with bases loaded, bringing home senior Andrew Smith to give Biola a 2-1 lead. Master’s then made a pitching change, bringing in sophomore Aaron Alexander, who pitched a scoreless 3.2 innings. Unfortunately, the Mustangs scored a run in the sixth and eighth innings, giving them the 3-2 lead that would be the final score.
FOCUSED ON THE GAME
Even though they lost, Groeschell felt encouraged by the way the team played, especially in the final game.
“The last game on Saturday was the way we should compete every day,” said Groeschell. “We were focused and ready to go to battle. We actually didn’t even play to our full potential, but that just shows how good we can actually be.”
The Eagles move to 3-5 overall and 1-5 in GSAC play. They play another difficult opponent, No. 18 Concordia, in the first of another three-game series at Eagles Diamond on Friday Feb. 6 at 2 p.m.
