Freshman Tanner Coggins belted a solo home run in the bottom of the tenth inning in Saturday's opening game between Wabash and Denison to give the Little Giants a 6-5 victory. Wabash managed just one hit in game two to fall 3-1, splitting the Saturday doubleheader.
The Tulsa, Oklahoma product (right) launched a pitch by Denison's Aidan Lucas over the left field fence to end the game. Lucas came into the game to nail down the save with the Big Red leading 5-4, but gave up a walk to Bobby Ritz to open the seventh inning. After a sacrifice bunt by Jake Thomas sent Ritz to second, Matt Dodaro singled up the middle to tie the score at 1-1. Neither team threatened to score in extra innings of the schedule seven-inning contest until Coggins' first career homer.
The two runs scored by Wabash off Lucas were the first two runs surrendered by the Denison sophomore this season. The extra inning victory was the third in as many tries for the Little Giants.
The Big Red jumped out to a 2-0 lead off a walk, a double, and a single by the first three batters of the game. Wabash responded with a two-out rally in its half of the first. Thomas singled, then moved to second when Dodaro was hit by a pitch. Coggins kept the rally alive when he reached on an error by the Denison shortstop. Shaun Rico took advantage of the mistake, scoring two runs with his single through the right side of the infield.
Wabash took its first lead in the third when Dodaro hit his team-leading sixth home run of the season and 17th of his career. The junior is now five homers away from the all-time Wabash record held by Matt Wilhelm '01 and Mike Mack '04.
Denison appeared to to have the game in hand after scoring three in the sixth. Freddie Marino came in for starter James Clear and held the Little Giants in check in sixth before giving way to Lucas in the seventh.
Keegan Leckrone (left) earned the victory in relief to improve to 5-1, throwing four innings of hitless baseball out of the bullpen. He has not allowed a hit in his last 10 innings of work over four games. Leckrone walked one and struck out two. Mike Korfhagen started, working six innnings with eight hits, four walks, and six strikeouts.
The Little Giants took a 1-0 lead in the first inning of game two when PJ Tyson walked and went to second on a wild pitch. Thomas collected what would prove to be the only hit of the game for Wabash with a single through the left side of the infield to score Tyson.
Denison answered with three in the second off starter Andy Weeks, who fell to 2-2 with the loss. Weeks went five innings, allowing five hits adn four walks with one strikeout. Patrick McCarley threw three innings of relief, scattering four hits and one walk with three K's.
Wabash (14-11, 4-2 NCAC West) and Denison (16-7, 7-3 NCAC West) close out the four-game series Sunday with a doubleheader scheduled to start at noon at Mud Hollow Field.