No. 24 Baseball Squeezes Win Out of Iowa, 6-5 in Game One of a Doubleheader – Ohio State Buckeyes
4/1/2001 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 1, 2001
Box Score
IOWA CITY, Iowa – Trailing 5-4 entering the seventh inning, the No. 24 Ohio State baseball team rallied with two runs to pull out a 6-5 win Sunday in the first game of a doubleheader at Iowa’s Duane Banks Field. The come-from-behind win extended the Buckeye winning streak to 17 games, as Ohio State improved to 20-4 overall and 3-0 in Big Ten play. Iowa falls to 8-10 and 0-4 in Big Ten games. The Buckeyes maintain sole possession of first place in the Big Ten.
With the Buckeyes down 5-4 in the top of the seventh inning, Christian Snavely (Fr., Defiance, Ohio) led off with a triple down the left field line. Doug Dendinger (Jr., Greenwich, Ohio) followed and reached base on a walk and then stole second base. John Mayor (Sr., Chesterfield, Mo.) tied the game with a sacrifice fly to right field, advancing Dendinger to third base. Joe Wilkins (Jr., Grove City, Ohio), with Dendinger barreling down the line on a squeeze play, put the squeeze bunt down in front of the plate. Pitcher Dyson Miguel failed to apply the tag on Dendinger, allowing the Buckeyes to grab a 6-5 lead.
Cory Cox (Sr., Chillicothe, Ohio) came in to preserve the win, firing a 1-2-3 inning to earn his fifth save of the season. Brandon Steen (Jr., Hendersonville, Tenn.) earned the win, pitching 1.2 innings of scoreless relief to improve to 2-1 on the season. Miguel (2-1) took the defeat.
The Buckeyes took the first lead of the ballgame in the top of the first inning. Mike Harris (Sr., Hillsborough, N.C.) led off with a double to right-center field and immediately moved to third base on a bunt single by Mike Check (Sr., Bay Village, Ohio). After a stolen base by Check and a walk by Nick Swisher (So., Parkersburg, W.Va.) to load the bases, Doug Deeds (Fr., Bexley, Ohio) lined a single to center field to score Harris and Check and give OSU a 2-0 lead.
In the bottom half of the innings, the Hawkeyes responded and took the lead with three runs off five hits. Ian Mattiace, Alex Dvorsky, and Toby Humes each contributed with RBI singles.
In the top of the fourth inning the Buckeyes tied the game at three. With the bases loaded, Check drove in Wilkins with a sacrifice fly to even the score.
The Buckeyes retook the lead in the top of the fifth inning. Deeds led off with a single, moved to second base on a sacrifice bunt by Snavely and scored on a double by Dendinger.
In the bottom of the fifth inning, Iowa retook the lead off a pair of unearned runs. With one out, Mattiace reached base on a fielding error by Harris at second base. Dvorsky followed with a single to center field to put runners at first and third base. A sacrifice bunt by Humes plated Mattiace and a single by Andy Jansen scored Dvorsky to give Iowa a 5-4 lead.
