The Monmouth College baseball team got great starting pitching from freshman Ethan Zaayenga (Tremont, Illinois) and crucial home runs from Raul Guillermo (Miami, Florida) and Nate Reed (Chenoa, Illinois) to pull off an 8-4 road win at Beloit on Monday. The Fighting Scots (16-17, 9-11) are in fifth place, 1.5 games behind Cornell for the final MWC Tournament spot with four games remaining.
WIth one out in the top of the first, Tyler Houck (Park Ridge, Illinois).drew a walk and Daniel Lummus (New Port Richey, Florida) doubled. Guillermo gave the Scots a 3-0 lead with a home run to center, his seventh of the season. Aidan Parkins (Monmouth, Illinois) walked and Alexander Dye (Albuquerque, New Mexico) singled but the Scots left two on base.
Zaayenga kept the Buccaneers off the board early before two doubles scored a run in the third . In the fourth, Monmouth added to the lead with a 2-out rally. Jacob Blunck (Forsyth, Illinois) singled and scored on a double by Aiden Scott (Carrollton, Texas).
The Scots got on the board again in the sixth. Parkins singled to start the inning and Dye’s double made it 5-1. After a sac bunt from Reed, Blunck made it 6-1 with a sacrifice fly.
Zaayenga continued to put up zeroes as the Scots led 6-1 into the eighth. Dye singled with two outs and Reed launched a 2-run homer to right for an 8-1 Monmouth lead. Beloit finally got to Zaayenga in the bottom of the inning but Brandon Coats (Mapleton, Illinois) got the last two outs of the inning as the Scots took an 8-4 lead into the ninth.
Nick Villa (El Segundo, California) threw the ninth in a non-save situation and walked the leadoff batter. Beloit put two on base with two outs but a groundout ended the game.
Zaayenga struck out nine batters over 7 1/3 innings with one walk. Coats retired two of the three batters he faced for a shutout 2/3 of an inning. Villa had a shutout inning with one hit allowed, one walk and one strikeout
MONMOUTH MOMENTS: Dye had three hits with a double and two singles Lummus has 12 multi-hit games on the season Lummus reached the 100 career-hit mark on Saturday, joining Guillermo and Houck as Scots to reach that milestone in 2024 He is tied for second on the team with eight doubles … Guillermo hit his 15th career home run, tied for ninth on the career list with Lou Vitali (1974-77) He is tied for eighth on the single-season list with seven homers, the most in a season since 2018 when Grant Myers hit 10 and Mike Dato hit eight Guillermo also moved into 10th place on the career RBI list with 92 Reed has four career homers, two in 2023 and two this season The 7 1/3 innings are a career-high for Zaayenga who went seven innings on March 13 and April 10 The nine strikeouts is also a new career high, surpassing the seven on April 10 against Knox Beloit won the season-series 2-1 and leads the all-time series 21-20 Monmouth ended the Bucs 6-game win streak in the series The Scots play on the road again on Tuesday with a 6 p.m. start at Augustana Monmouth plays at Knox on Thursday before hosting first-place Lawrence on Saturday and Sunday.
***Courtesy of Nathan Baliva, Monmouth College***
