The Peacock baseball team nearly pulled off an upset that would have been instrumental in giving the team’s postseason chances new life today in St. Cloud, Minnesota. Upper Iowa fell in game one of the NSIC double header by a 1-0 count to the #11 Huskies. 

 

The home team scored the games only run in the bottom of the first inning to spoil an otherwise brilliant performance from starter Brett Westra. In the second game, SCSU out muscled UIU taking a 10-3 victory and the day’s sweep.

 

After the losses, Upper Iowa falls to 20-26 overall and 14-18 in the NSIC with four games remaining at Northern State. Three teams remain in the running for the sixth and final spot in the NSIC Baseball Tournament; including Concordia (currently 6th), Minnesota Duluth (currently 7th), and UIU (currently 8th).

 

While Upper Iowa must win all four games against the Wolves of Northern State to reach .500, the Golden Bears will face the #11 Huskies in four games this weekend and the Bulldogs will match up with the Golden Eagles of UMC at home. 

 

In game one, the Huskies opened the bottom of the first with a double and had runners on the corners with no outs. A sacrifice fly drove in the runner from third and gave St. Cloud the early lead.

 

Both pitchers, Westra for UIU and Scott Lieser for SCSU took control of the game. After the leadoff double, the Peacock starter held the Husky bats without a hit until the sixth inning, while the Husky hurler did not allow a Peacock hit until the fifth when Mikey Henrichs opened the inning with a single up the middle. Henrichs got to third with one out and tried to score on a ground ball to short, but the Huskies made the throw home in time to catch Henrichs. Upper Iowa got a hit in the sixth and one in the seventh, but neither runner advanced past first; the hits belonged to Nick Bergeman and Matt Corbitt.

 

Lieser improved to 7-0 on the year with 5.2 innings against the Peacocks, while Ryan Schwenke came in for his sixth save. Brett Westra fell to 0-2 despite six strong innings in which the righthander allowed just one run on two hits in six innings.

 

In game two, Upper Iowa got on the board first in the second inning when a Matt Corbitt two-out walk was followed by a two-run homerun over the leftfield wall by Will Loza. The lead was short-lived though; SCSU stormed back with three runs on three hits in the bottom half of the inning. 

 

Juve Reyes tripled to open the third for UIU as the Peacocks looked to tie it up right away, but with one out Rudy Casillas hit a fly ball to center that Reyes attempted to score on. The throw from the centerfielder was on the money and the Upper Iowa threat was put down.

 

The Huskies added one in the third and three more in the fourth to pull out to a 7-2 lead midway through the game. In the sixth, the Peacocks put men on first and second with no outs thanks to back-to-back walks, but a pair of strikeouts and a ground out stranded the runners in their tracks.

 

One more run in the sixth and two more in the seventh gave St. Cloud a commanding 10-2 lead. The Peacocks threatened again in the eighth loading the bases with two outs, but the team couldn’t get the hit needed to rally. In the ninth, UIU pushed a run across as Luis Rodriguez led off the inning with a solo shot to left field.

 

Nick Maiers got the win and improved to 4-0, while Tyler Beck fell to 1-3 after going four innings and allowing seven runs, six earned, on eight hits and six walks. Josh Luke threw an inning of scoreless relief, as did Matt Golden.

 

At the plate, Reyes and Rodriguez each had a pair of hits.