Lamar sweeps series over MCC baseball with Sunday wins

LAMAR, Colo. – The Lamar Community College baseball team scored a come-from-behind win in the second game of a Sunday doubleheader to complete a four-game sweep over McCook Community College. Lamar won the first game Sunday 6-1 and took the second one 12-11.

"It was a tough loss in the last game, "said MCC Coach Jon Olsen. "We finally put a few at bats together and worked ourselves into a couple leads -- a big lead early and enough of a lead late -- but just couldn't hold it."

MCC took an 8-3 lead in the fourth inning of Game 2 and went up 11-9 in the sixth inning, but Lamar responded.

"Credit to Lamar they kept answering they just had our number all weekend," Olsen said.

After sweeping Saturday's doubleheader as well, Lamar improves to 12-21 on the season and 9-5 in Empire League play.

MCC goes to 12-16 overall and 6-8 in the Empire League.

Next up for MCC is a mid-week doubleheader at Crete against the Doane JV team Wednesday, followed with a four-game home series against Luna Community College Saturday and Sunday with doubleheaders starting both days at 1 p.m.

"We'll have to go back to the drawing board a bit and I hope we show we have a hard-nosed group that can keep working and get back up when you have a tough weekend," Olsen said.

For all the up-to-date information on MCC baseball this season including, schedules, statistics, rosters and photos, please visit the official website of MCC Athletics at: https://mccookcc.prestosports.com/landing/index

GAME 1 – Lamar 6, McCook 1: Lamar scored a pair of runs in both the first and second innings and added single runs in the fifth and sixth innings.

Ethan Fritz (Bellevue, Neb.) pitched 5.2 innings, allowed five earned runs, struck out nine and walked three. Eduardo Ojeda (Coral Springs, Fla) came on to strikeout the only batter he faced in the sixth.

MCC got its only run of the game with two outs in the sixth inning on a double by Jordan DeMarce (Las Vegas) who scored on two wild pitches.

MCC had five hits in the game with DeMarce's double, the only extra-base hit.

GAME 2 – Lamar 12, McCook 11: MCC took an 8-3 lead in the fourth inning but Lamar scored nine times in their final three at bats to sweep the four game series.

MCC starter Mikey Acierno (freshmanThornton, Colo.) issued a leadoff walk and on his sixth pitch of the game got down 2-0 with a two-run Lope home run.

Freshman Oliver Davies (Sydney, Australia) led off the third inning with a solo homer that started a five-run frame. With two out, freshman Ethan Murdoch (Swift Current, Saskatchewan) tied the game with an RBI-single, Josh Maysonave (Austin, Texas) followed with an-RBI single and sophomore Elijah Munoz (Big Spring, Texas) put MCC up 5-2 with his run-scoring single.

After Lamar scored a run in the bottom of the third, MCC scored three more times in the fourth on a three-run home run by sophomore Zack Beatty (Maple Park, Ill.) to give MCC an 8-3 lead. Lamar came back to score six times in the fourth to take a 9-8 lead.  

Acierno pitched 3.1 innings allowed, four hits and four earned runs with a walk and a strikeout before being relieved by Alex Lozada (sophomore, Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico) who surrendered a pair of home runs in his one-third inning of work, but only one earned run.

After neither team scored in the fifth, MCC reclaimed the lead with three runs in the sixth inning, on a two-run Beatty homer and a Maysonave RBI-double to put MCC up 11-9.

Lamar scored three runs in the sixth off Jordan Muschalek (Odessa, Texas). He went 2.1 innings allowing three earned runs on one hit. He struck out six.

MCC outhit Lamar 13-7. Five players had two hits games including Beatty, Maysonave, Murdoch, Davies and sophomore Markus Coronado (Irving, Texas).