The Monmouth College baseball team secured a winning trip to Florida with a 5-4 win over Lasell University on Thursday. The Scots (6-4) combined timely hitting with strong pitching and defense to win their second game in a row.
“Today was a total team win, pitching, hitting and defense,” said head coach Alan Betourne. “Toby battled for us today and really liked what he did for us and then Owen came in, settled us down and got it done.”
Lasell took the lead against starting pitcher Toby Turnquist (Monmouth, Illinois) in the top of the second. They put two in scoring position with a hit, walk, stolen base and a wild pitch before a two-out, two-run single.
Monmouth answered immediately with a multi-run inning. Aidan Parkins (Monmouth, Illinois) walke and stole second before Reid Stufflebeem (Galesburg, Illinois) singled. Jacob Blunck (Forsyth, Illinois) brought home both runners with a triple to left-center, tying the game. Aiden Scott (Carrollton, Texas) put the Scots up 3-2 with an infield single and he moved to second on an errant throw. Clayton Matkovic (Sherrard, Illinois) singled home Scott for a 4-2 lead,
“The guys believe they can cash in like that and it is one of those games where you scratch one or two across and hold them on defense and that’s what we did today against a good hitting team,” said Betourne.
Lasell threatened in the fifth but Turnquist got a strikeout to leave runners on first and third. The Lasers loaded the bases in the sixth with a double and two walks. Owen Wolfe (Galesburg, Illinois) took over on the mound with two outs and Lasell tied the game with a single.
Monmouth regained the lead in the bottom of the sixth. Matkovic doubled to right with one out and moved to third on a single by Houck. Lummus gave the Scots a 5-4 lead with a sacrifice fly to center.
Turnquist took a no-decision with a career-high 5 innings. The lefty struck out three and walked five. Wolfe (1-0) shut the Lasers down over the final three innings for the win. He struck out three and allowed two hits over 3 innings.
MONMOUTH MOMENTS: Lummus extended his hit streak to nine games. He has four multi-hit games on the seasonMatkovic had four hits for the second straight game, including two doublesHe leads the Scots with four doubles and he is 8-for-10 over the last two games with three doubles, four RBI and three runs scoredThe triple was Blunck’s first extra-base hit and he has RBI in two straight gamesTurnquist’s previous career high was 4 innings against Blackburn in the season openerWolfe had a career-high 3 innings after throwing three innings on SaturdayHe also had a win in 2022Monmouth starting pitchers have gone at least five innings in four of the eight games in Florida and at least four innings in six gamesBetween the sixth inning of game two on Wednesday and the second inning of Thursday’s game, the Scots sent at least nine batters to the plate in three of four inningsThe Scots beat Lasell twice in 2012 on the Florida trip, the only previous meetings between the schoolsMonmouth finishes the Florida trip on Friday with a single game against Gettysburg at 10 a.m. ET.
***Courtesy of Nathan Baliva, Monmouth College***
