5/28/2004 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
MT. PLEASANT, Mich. The Kent State University baseball team (34-25) earned a ticket to the championship game of the 2004 MAC Tournament with a 10-6 win over No. 4 Eastern Michigan (31-26) Friday afternoon at Theunissen Stadium. The Flashes will face the winner of Saturdays noon game between No. 2 Miami and No. 4 Eastern Michigan at 3 p.m. with the winner gaining an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
The Flashes will be making their third championship game appearance in the last four years and eighth overall.
(The six-run second) was huge because we did not get started on the right foot, head coach Rick Rembielak said. We answered the bell which helped us especially here early on. I thought after that first inning it was going to be a slugfest and that is not a team you want to do that with. I think that is an attribute to our pitching staff shutting an offense like that down. We kicked the ball around a little bit behind them, but they held true.
Like the previous game, the Flashes turned to its bullpen to shut their opponent down in the late innings. Ryan Davis came on in the sixth and pitched 3.0 scoreless innings while recording five strikeouts. Kent State then turned to Chad Wagler in the ninth who recorded two Ks and picked up his sixth save of the season. Justin Laraway (3-3) picked up the win for Kent State after giving up five earned runs in 5.0 innings. He also struck out three.
Chad Kinyon and Chuck Moore led the Flashes at the plate, each going 3-for-5 with two RBI. Kinyon, who homered in the third, extended hit streak to 19 games.
Eastern Michigan jumped on Laraway in the first with three runs on three hits. After Ryan Arnett and Brian Bixler reached on back-to-back singles, Derrick Peterson cleared the bases with a homer to left to give Eastern Michigan a 3-0 lead.
The Flashes answered in their half of the second with six on seven hits. After a double by Will Vazquez and single by Kurt Eichorn put runners at second and third, Adam Crowder hit an RBI bloop single to left to score Vazquez. Next, Eric Holick drove an RBI double to deep right to plate Eichorn from second. The inning continued when Joe Tucker lined a single to left to score Crowder for the third run. Andrew Davis then hit a bases-clearing double to left-center, scoring Holick and Tucker. Moore then capped off the scoring with an RBI single up the middle to plate Davis and make it 6-3 Kent State.
Kimlings double off the wall in center field scored Matt Moffett, cutting Kent States lead to two, before Arnetts double to left brought in Kimling to make it 6-5 KSU.
The hit-fest continued in the top of the third when Crowder led off with a solo home run over the 16-foot wall in center, his seventh of the season. Then, after Tucker drew a walk, Kinyon blasted his 15th dinger of the season, a two-run opposite field shot to give Kent State a 9-5 lead.
Eastern Michigan would add one in the third. After an error by Kinyon kept the inning alive, Moffett doubled down the right field line to put runners at second and third. Trumaine Riley then beat out an infield single to plate Hrovat and make it 9-6 Kent State after three full innings.
The game was then scoreless until the top of the eighth when Moore delivered a single up the middle, scoring Kinyon who reached on a lead off single to left.
