Hosting its first night game in over four years, the University of La Verne baseball team outlasted Pomona-Pitzer in a 3 hour, 45 minute contest that saw the Leopards rally for a 9-8 win over the Sagehens in 10 innings Friday night at Mazmanian Field on the Mt. SAC campus.
Trailing 8-7 in the bottom of the 10th, La Verne would push across two runs to conclude the come-from-behind win as Jason Moralez hit a walk-off sacrifice fly to complete the comeback win as the contest ended at 11:15 pm.
Michael Stewart led off the bottom of the inning with a single through the right side. Jacob Ludvik and Zach Canfield both were hit-by-a-pitch to load the bases. A walk by George Hanna brought in the tying run, and was followed by Moralez, who delivered the deep fly out to centerfield to plate Ludvik with the game-winning run.
Trailing by as many as four runs, La Verne would take the lead after scoring a run in the eighth inning for a 7-6 lead, but the Hens would score in the ninth to tie the game and later would add a run in the top of the 10th to take an 8-7 advantage before the Leopards rallied in the bottom half.
Pomona-Pitzer opened the contest with a run in the first inning off of an RBI single by Nick Gentili. The score would remain 1-0 until the sixth inning. The Hens were able to take a 4-0 lead scoring three runs off of two hits and a Leopard error. La Verne responded back scoring two runs from a single up the middle by Hanna and a single to center field by Cody Hazel, cutting the deficit to two.
The Sagehens would go on to score two more runs in the top of the seventh to take a 6-2 lead, but a four-run seventh inning for the Leopards would knot the game at six. La Verne led off with a walk, and a single by Stewart to put runners on first and third. Ludvik hit and RBI single to score the first run. A wild-pitch by Robert Weller would score the second run of the inning. An error by Pomona-Pitzer and an RBI ground-out by Hazel would score the final two runs of the inning.
Nathan Rollon recorded the win after coming in to pitch at the end of the 10th inning. The loss went to Leo Rosetti. Hazel and Hanna led the team with two RBIs each. Ludvik was 2 for 3 at the plate with one RBI and three runs scored.
La Verne is currently in first place in SCIAC with an overall record of 12-5 and a conference record of 8-2. Pomona-Pitzer falls to 7-6 in conference and 8-6-1 overall.
The Leopards will head to Claremont for the doubleheader against the Sagehens tomorrow. The first game will start at 11:00am.
