Baseball Drops Final Game in Florida

Home opener set for Wednesday

by Nathan Baliva

MONMOUTH, Ill. (03/15/2024) — The Monmouth College baseball team finished their Florida trip with a 5-3 loss to Gettysburg College on Friday. The Scots (6-5) went 5-4 on the Florida trip and return home to face Blackburn and Illinois College.

"I'm really excited to get back after this successful trip and get to work on Monday in practice for some home games," said head coach Alan Betourne. "We are ready to get to work and these guys are hungry."

Starting pitcher Cade Sharp (Aledo, Illinois) gave up five runs, three earned in the bottom of the first. Gettysburg had two singles and an error to load the bases before a single and a double made it 4-0. The fifth run scored on a run down during a caught stealing.

'That first inning is going to haunt us for a little bit," said Betourne. "We had a chance to get right back into it but didn't execute in a rough first three innings."

Raul Guillermo (Miami, Florida) and Aidan Parkins (Monmouth, Illinois) both singled in the second to put two on with nobody out. However, the Scots were unable to push a run across. Jacob Blunck (Forsyth, Illinois) threw out a Bullets player at the plate from right field to end the second inning.

"We challenged the guys to have a mini reset after the third inning and win the final six innings." said Betourne. "We did that, we just didn't score enough and credit to out guys for battling back."

The Scots got on the board in the fourth. Parkins beat out an infield single with two outs and scored on a double to right-center by Alexander Dye (Albuquerque, New Mexico). In the fifth, Aiden Scott (Carrollton, Texas) was hit by a pitch to start the inning and Jonas Buckles (Albuquerque, New Mexico) singled. With runners on the corners, Clayton Matkovic (Sherrard, Illinois) delivered a sacrifice fly to center. With two down and a runner on second, Daniel Lummus (New Port Richey, Florida) doubled to cut the Bullets lead to 5-3.

Monmouth threatened in the eighth. Lummus singled with one out and moved to third on a single by Guillermo. Gettysburg changed pitchers and escaped the inning with a pop up and a groundout. Monmouth put a runner on base in the ninth but ultimately fell 5-3.

"The reset was good and we defended well later in the game with a couple good throws," said Betourne.

Sharp allowed three earned runs over six innings while striking out six. Nick Villa (El Segundo, California) struck out four over two hitless and scoreless innings of relief.

MONMOUTH MOMENTS: Lummus extended his hit streak to 10 gamesHe has five multi-hit games on the seasonBuckles had his first hit of the season in his first startMonmouth starting pitchers went at least five innings in five of the nine games in Florida and at least four innings in seven gamesVilla has four strikeouts in two of his three outings and overall has 10 strikeouts in 4 inningsMonmouth hit .337 over the nine games in Florida with 71 runs scored for an average of 7.9 runs per gameThe Scots had 23 extra-base hits, 39 walks and were 10-for-11 in stolen base attemptsThe pitchers struck out 62 and walked 26 on the trip while allowing just two home runsLummus led the team with 16 hits as he hit .516 for the weekMatkovic had 15 hits while Houck (12) and Dye (11) were also in double digitsScott scored 11 runs, one more than Matkovic on the tripLummus drove in 10 runs, Guillermo, Matkovic and Houck drove in eight while Dye drove in sevenLummus had four doublesMatkovic had three doubles and two triplesMonmouth pitchers struck out 62 and walked 26 in 68 innings on the tripSharp led the pitchers with 13.1 innings and 13 strikeoutsEthan Zaayenga (Tremont, Illinois) threw nine innings while Owen Wolfe (Galesburg, Illinois) threw eight and both Toby Turnquist (Monmouth, Illinois) and Brandon Coats (Mapleton, Illinois) topped seven inningsZaayenga struck out nine, Wolfe had eight and Roy Ralston (Macon, Illinois) struck out sevenThe 5-4 trip is the best Florida trip for the Scots since going 8-2 in 2019The Scots are 1-3 all-time against Gettysburg with a DH split in 2022 and a loss in 2014, all in FloridaThe Scots host Blackburn at 3 p.m. Wednesday in the home opener and then begin Midwest Conference play next Saturday with a Noon DH at home against Illinois College.