Ohio State Rally Falls Short as No. 7 Georgia Wins 4-3 – Ohio State Buckeyes
3/4/2005 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
March 4, 2005
Box Score
GREENVILLE, N.C. – Ohio State put the first run on the scoreboard, but Georgia countered with a three-run home run in the third and a solo shot in the fifth and held on to down the Buckeyes 4-3 in front of 4,410 fans in game two of the Keith LeClair Classic at Clark-LeClair Stadium.
Georgia had taken a 4-1 lead in the fifth inning and kept Ohio State bats quiet until the eighth inning when had three hits on reliever Joshua Fields. Ronnie Bourquin (So., Canton, Ohio/Canton South) led off the inning with a single up the middle and then Matt Angle (Fr., Whitehall, Ohio/Whitehall-Yearling) singled through the left side after Eric Fryer (Fr., Reynoldsburg, Ohio/Reynoldsburg) struck out. With two on and two out after a Paul Farinacci (Sr., Westlake Village, Calif./Agoura) fly out, Jedidiah Stephen (Jr., Caldwell, Ohio/Shenandoah) delivered the last two Buckeye runs with a double down the left-field line to close within the one-run final.
Ohio State struck first, scoring one run in the second inning. Georgia starter Sean Ruthven walked Jason Zoeller (So., Verona, Pa./Shady Side Academy) with one out. And then Zoeller went to second on a wild pitch and to third on a passed ball. Wes Schirtzinger (So., Westerville, Ohio/Westerville South) singled to centerfield to score Zoeller and give the Buckeyes the early 1-0 lead. Ruthven left the game after walking Jacob Howell (So., Ashland, Ohio/Ashland), his fourth walk of the game. Georgia went with Will Startup, who got Mike Rabin (Sr., West Chester, Ohio/Lakota East) to ground into a double play to end the inning. Buckeye starter Mike Madsen (Sr., Canfield, Ohio/Notre Dame Cathedral Latin) kept the Bulldogs off the scoreboard until the bottom of the third inning. Already with a pair of strikeouts in the game, he struck out the first two batters of the inning, but walked the next two before giving up his first home run of the season, a towering shot by Georgia catcher Derek Smith over the fence in right field to lift Georgia to a 3-1 lead.
Startup gave up a double to Bourquin to start the third, but retired 15 of the final 17 batters he faced. Those two hits came off the bats of Zoeller, who singled in the top of the fourth, and Howell, who singled in the seventh. Josh Morris gave the Bulldogs a three-run lead in the bottom of the fifth inning. His second home run of the season cleared the right-field fence giving Georgia a 4-1 lead.
Madsen topped the 100-pitch mark in the fifth inning and gave way to left-handed pitcher Cory Luebke (Fr., Maria Stein, Ohio/Marion Local) in the sixth. Madsen, who got the loss to fall to 1-1 on the young season, departed after giving up four runs on seven hits with four walks and four strikeouts. Luebke pitched the sixth and seventh before Brett Hatcher (Sr., Bellefontaine, Ohio/Bellefontaine) retired the final three Georgia batters in the bottom of the eighth. Startup, who earned his first win of the season, gave way to Joshua Fields to start the eighth inning, allowing only three hits to go with a pair of strikeouts in 5.2 innings. Mitchell Boggs started the ninth and gave up a lead-off hit before sitting the next three batters down to end the game and pick up his second save of the season.
Georgia improved to 7-1 on the season thanks to Bobby Felmy, who had three of the Bulldogs’ eight hits, but it was Smith’s three-run homer and Morris’ solo shot that did in the Buckeyes. Bourquin and Schirtzinger each had two of Ohio State’s eight hits. Each team had one error.
Ohio State, 1-2, will play No. 4 North Carolina Saturday at 2 p.m. before closing play at the Keith LeClair Classic Sunday at 10 a.m. against Arizona State.
