Monmouth College

Baseball Rallies Past Beloit but Season Ends with Loss to IC

by Nathan Baliva

MONMOUTH, Ill. (05/09/2026) — The Monmouth College baseball team won their first game at the MWC Tournament on Saturday but fell to Illinois College 11-4, ending their season. The Fighting Scots (17-23) rallied to beat Beloit 7-6 in a game that was suspended Friday night before falling to the Blueboys.

The Scots and Buccaneers were suspended due to darkness on Friday night/ The game resumed with Beloit batting in the top of the eighth and leading 6-4.

WIll Baumgartner (Sycamore, Illinois) kept Beloit off the board in the eighth. Hunter Wheat (Athens, Illinois) led off the inning with a triple and Gabriel Zeigler-Harris (East Peoria, Illinois) walked to put the tying run on base. Aidan Parkins (Monmouth, Illinois) collected his fifth hit of the game with a double that scored both runners and tied the game. With Parkins on third and one down, Clayton Matkovic (Sherrard, Illinois) put the Scots on top 7-6 with a sacrifice fly.

The Bucs picked up a single and a walk with one out in the ninth. Owen Wolfe (Galesburg, Illinois) came out of the bullpen and an infield single loaded the bases. Wolfe recorded a strikeout for the second out and got a flyout to left to end the game.

Ethan Zaayenga (Tremont, Illinois) started the game on Friday and allowed six runs on nine hits and two walks over five innings while striking out four. Clayton Rentschler (Riverton, Illinois) threw two shutout innings with a strikeout. Baumgartner (3-2) got the win with 1 1/3 shutout innings as he struck out one and Wolfe earned his third save.

GAME TWO

The game was scoreless into the third when IC took the lead against Brandon Coats (Mapleton, Illinois). Two errors started the inning and the Blueboys took advantage with a stolen base and two straight singles. Another error made it 4-0 before the Scots got out of the inning.

Monmouth answered in the bottom of the inning as Parkins hit his first home run of the season. The two-out solo blast was followed by an Aiden Scott (Carrollton, Texas) walk but no other runs scored.

Parkins homered again with two outs in the fifth. His second solo shot of the game cut the score to 4-2 and Scott followed with a single but IC got out of the inning.

Grant Vessey (Elma, Washington) started the sixth with a single and a fielders' choice put Eric Campen (Washington, Illinois) on base. Jacob Blunck (Forsyth, Illinois) singled but two straight outs stranded runners at second and third.

IC scored a run off Baumgartner in the seventh to lead 5-2. Monmouth again brought the tying run to the plate as Scott and Matkovic singled but both were left on.

IC broke the game open against Roy Ralston (Macon, Illinois) in the eighth. A leadoff walk, wild pitch and groundout made it 6-2 and two more singles put the Blueboys on top by five. A leadoff homer in the ninth made it 8-2 and after a walk, Ralston gave way to Wolfe. Two hits and a sacrifice fly put IC on top 11-2

The Scots scored the final runs in the ninth. Wheat reached on an error and Zeigler-Harris homered to left, cutting the deficit to 11-4. IC advanced to the championship round with three straight outs.

Coats (3-6) took the loss as he allowed one earned run on three hits and three walks over six innings. Baumgartner allowed one run on three hits in one inning. Ralston allowed four runs on three hits and two walks over 1 1/3 innings and Wolfe gave up two runs in 2/3 of an inning.

MONMOUTH MOMENTS: Parkins had five hits in the Beloit game and was 7-for-10 in the two games that ended Saturday ... He hit his first homer of the season against IC and then added another for his first multi-homer game ... Zeigler-Harris hit his second homer of the season ,,, Blunck, Matkovic and Scott also had multi-hit games ... Parkins had 21 multi-hit games on the season ... He led the Scots in batting average (.391), hits (63), runs (44) steals (11) and OPS (.987) ... His 63 hits are second-most in a season in school history and his 44 runs are fifth ... Scott, Matkovic, Almaguer and Zeigler-Harris started all 40 games ... Matkovic moved into a tie for 10th on the career hits list ... Zaayenga made his 30th career start, ninth in MC history ... Wolfe finished his career with eight saves, third most in Monmouth history ... He also made 43 appearances, fifth-most ... The Scots are 25-26 against Beloit all-time, 5-2 in the MWC Tournament,..Monmouth is 117-80 all-time against IC, 2-2 in the MWC Tournament.