WENHAM, Mass. -- The Bates College baseball team won back-to-back games for the first time in over a month, sweeping a doubleheader at Gordon College 7-3 and 8-1 in a pair of seven-inning, non-conference games Wednesday.
The Bobcats (11-12) rode nine hits and strong starting pitching from senior
Dillon Dresser (Falmouth, Maine) in the first game, then scored eight runs on just four hits in the second game. Junior
Chris Ward (Pasadena, Calif.) shut out the Fighting Scots on four hits and no walks in his six-inning start.
Bates hosts the University of Southern Maine for a nine-inning game on Thursday at 3:30pm.
Game 1 Recap
Sophomore
John Dinucci (West Hartford, Conn.) hit his first college home run in the fourth inning for the first run of the day, and the Bobcats then mounted a two-out rally later in the inning. Sophomore
Ryan McCarthy (Plaistow, N.H.) singled to right to score junior
Conor Reenstierna (Lincoln, Mass.) and senior
John Anagnost (Boulder, Colo.), who drew two of Bates' three walks in the inning.
Bates added two more runs in the fifth with four hits off of Gordon starter Colin Strapp (1-2). Reenstierna singled first-year
Jake Shapiro (Sandy, Utah) home, and senior
Rockwell Jackson (Fort Worth, Texas) drove in Reenstierna and sophomore
Brendon Canavan (Carlisle, Mass.) with a single to right.
Reenstierna was 2-for-2 in the game with two runs and two RBIs, including a run-scoring single in the seventh. Dinucci also went 2-for-2.
Dresser allowed one run on five hits and a walk over 4 1/3 innings to pick up the win.
Game 2 Recap
Gordon starter Larry Torres hit four batters in 2 1/3 innings, including three in the third inning, all three of whom scored to give Bates a 3-1 lead.
Ward struck out five batters in his best outing of the season, raising his record to 1-1. First-year
Connor Speed (Cumberland, Maine) pitched a shutout seventh inning to wrap up the sweep.
Gordon reliever Tyler Norquist hit two more Bates batters in the fourth inning -- Shapiro and senior
Sam Berry (Hamilton, Mass.) -- and both later came home on senior
Mekae Hyde's (Lewiston, Maine) three-run double. Junior
Evan Czopek (Portland, Ore.) also scored on the hit after singling.
Berry added a solo home run to center field in the sixth inning, his second homer of the season.
Berry was 1-for-2 in the game with two runs and two RBIs, while Hyde drove in four runs in the game on one hit plus a sacrifice fly.