MCC Baseball wins twice at Salina vs. Coyote JVs

SALINA, Kan. – The McCook Community College baseball picked up a pair of wins Wednesday against Kansas Wesleyan's JV team. MCC won 8-1 and 9-2 in extra innings.

"It was good to get back into the win column today after a tough day Sunday," said MCC Coach Jon Olsen.

In Game 1, MCC opened up a 2-1 lead in the fifth inning adding runs in the final three frames and after leading 2-0 in the seventh inning of Game 2, came back to score seven runs in the extra inning to get the sweep.

 "We really pitched it well today," said Olsen. MCC used eight guys on the mound. "Outside of one pitch in the seventh inning of Game 2, our guys were really tough on them today," Olsen said.

MCC improves to 22-20 on the season. The Coyote Developmental team goes to 8-16-1 on the year.

The coach was able to play a lot of position players in the doubleheader.

"So that was really good as well," Olsen said. "We have to get back and ready to go for this weekend, it's a big one for us."

On Friday MCC will host Empire-Conference leading Southeast Community College in a three-game series. The Storm are 31-6 and 21-1 in Region IX play and are coming off a three-game sweep this past weekend over Northeastern Junior College. Southeast has won 15 straight games and lead the Empire League North Division.

MCC handed the Storm their only Region IX loss in a three-game series March 13-14. The Storm won Game 1 of that series 13-8, MCC won the middle game 12-11, and the Storm won the finale 13-10.

First pitch for the series opener Friday is at 3 p.m. with the Saturday doubleheader to begin at 1 p.m. (You can see the Region IX Standings below today's game summaries).

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 – McCook CC 8, Kansas Wesleyan JV 1: Trailing 1-0 in the third, MCC got extra life with a two-out Coyote error when Kade-Poteet-Herrera (Pueblo, Colo.) doubled in two runners to give MCC the lead for good.

Freshman Mikey Acierno (Thornton, Colo.) got the start and went three innings on the mound, allowed one earned run, three hits, two walks and he struck out six.

MCC added a run in the fifth on a leadoff double by sophomore Zack Beatty (Maple Park, Ill.) and a sacrifice off the bat of freshman Oliver Davies (Sydney, Australia). Two more runs came home when a Coyote error led to two unearned runs and a 5-1 MCC lead.

Freshman Josh Maysonave (Austin, Texas) led off the seventh inning with a single. Poteet-Herrera delivered a one out followed by RBI singles from Brett Cyprien (freshman, Flower Mound, Texas), Melwin Perez (sophomore San Sebastian, Puerto Rico) and Daniel Bannon (sophomore, Sydney, Australia).

Freshman Rylan Wallingford (Fort Calhoun, Neb.) came on in relief in the fourth inning and shut out the Kansans over four innings on one hit and five strikeouts.

MCC outhit Kansas Wesleyan 12-4 with three hits by Bannon and two each from Beatty, Maysonave, Perez and Poteet-Herrera.

GAME 2 – McCook CC 9, Kansas Wesleyan JV: MCC put up two runs in the third inning on one-out singles from sophomores Daegen Morocom (Winnipeg, Manitoba), Persio Quezada, (Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic), and an RBI single from freshman Riley Watson (Sydney, Australia).

On the mound MCC paraded four straight pitchers who shutout the Coyotes in one inning of work. Those pitchers included: Freshman starter Jelle Bing (Heerhagoaard, Netherlands), sophomore Tristan Browning (Haslet, Texas), sophomore Eduardo Ojeda (Coral Springs, Fla), and freshman Jackson Bigge (Fort Collins, Colo.). They collectively held the opponents to one hit with two walks and six strikeouts.

Owen Lester (St. Charles, Ill.) came on in the fifth to toss two shutout innings on two walks and six strikeouts, but in the bottom of the seventh, KWJV greeted reliever C.J. Allen (freshman, Salado, Texas) with a single and a two-run homer run to tie the game and send it to extra innings.

"Even in that inning after they tied it we really had to pitch to take it to extras, then we were able to break it open in the eighth with a couple big swings with the bases loaded both times," Olsen said.

In the eighth, MCC reclaimed the lead with a two-run double by Ethan Murdoch (Swift Current, Saskatchewan), and a grand slam from freshman Justin Chappel, (Colorado Springs) to make it a 9-2 game.

Allen came on to pitch a scoreless eighth to record the win. He went two innings, allowed three hits, walked two and struck out three.

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REGION IX STANDINGS - EMPIRE LEAGUE

SOUTH CONFERENCE

                                   W – L            WIN%  

   Trinidad State           15-10              .600     

   Lamar CC                 11-14              .440

   Otero JC                    7-18              .280

   Luna CC                    5-10              .200

   WEEKEND SCHEDULE (All three game series)

   Lamar at Otero - Friday DH, 1 pm (MT), Saturday, 1 p.m. (MT)

   Luna at Trinidad State – Saturday at 1 p.m. (MT); Sunday DH at 1 p.m. (MT)

NORTH CONFERENCE

                               W – L            WIN% 

   Southeast CC        21- 1               .955

   McCook CC           14-11              .560

   Northeastern JC    12-11              .522

   Western Neb.        10-10              .500

   WEEKEND SCHEDULE (All three game series)

   Southeast at McCook - Friday 3 p.m.; Saturday DH), 1 p.m.

   Northeastern JC at Western Neb. – Friday DH at 1 p.m. (MT); Saturday at 1 p.m. (MT)