Madison Wyker/The Carolinian

By Terrence Hinds, Staff Writer

Published in print Apr. 15, 2015

The UNCG baseball team lost a weekend series to Furman, with the Paladins taking two out of three games from the Spartans.

UNCG was able to somewhat salvage the series on Sunday and avoid being swept, but had a tough two game stretch to start out the series at the UNCG Baseball Stadium.

The results of the weekend outing puts the Spartans at 15-17 overall and 6-6 in conference play.

The one victory out of three games places the Spartans in fifth place in the Southern Conference.

Game 1 escalated quickly against the Spartans, as the Paladins jumped out to an early lead, putting up six runs in the very first inning of the series.

That inning definitely set the tone for the rest of the series and placed the Blue and Gold on their heals right from the start.

This was a position which the team was at throughout the weekend against Furman.

The Paladins ended up hammering three home runs, 12 hits, and were able to strike out 13 Spartan batters on their way to a dominant 9-4 win.

The Spartans were able to get 10 hits in their home stadium, and also extended their home run streak to 12 straight, which is a school record.

Junior pitcher Ryan Clark fell to 5-3 overall and did not play up to the standards which earned the starter Southern Conference pitcher of the month of March.

He gave up seven runs on eight hits with four walks but was able to strike out nine batters.

Matt Solter came in relief of Clark but he allowed four runs on ten hits.

The Spartans were simply not able to respond offensively after the first inning, although they did try hard.

Senior outfielders Eric Kalbfleisch and Tyler Long ended up with two hits apiece while senior infielder Hunter King scored a run and drove in a pair.

His sixth home run of the campaign in the fifth inning tied him for the team lead with classmate Aaron Wright.

Chris Ohmstede paced Furman with three hits, a run scored and three driven in. In the end it just wasn’t enough.

Game two again was not much of a competition for the Spartans of UNC-Greensboro.

The Spartan’s were not able to put up a single run in the game, while the Paladins put up ten of their own.

Once again the Paladins put up double figure hits in this game with thirteen, four of which were extra base hits.

The home team squandered a bunch of opportunities in this game.

UNCG failed to connect on timely hitting, as the Blue and Gold stranded runners on base in every inning of the game.

Freshman RHP Andrew Wantz took his first loss of the season dropping to 5-1 nine runs on 12 hits over 6 2/3 innings.  Though he walked off the mound with the lost, Wantz did not have a terrible performance.

He did not issue a walk and struck out a career-high eight batters.

Grant Schuermann threw seven innings and scattered seven hits with four strikeouts and no walks for the Furman Paladins.

This game was pretty much a no contest.

Game three was an exciting battle, as the home side was able to snatch a victory after a very early and deep deficit to avoid the sweep.

Just like game one, the Spartans went down 6-0 after the very first inning, likely causing fans to sigh of thoughts of Friday afternoon.

Only this time, they were able to put up eight unanswered runs and they got their second walk off victory of the week as they won the game 9-8.

Senior LHP Blair Betts was incredible in the contest as he was called upon to relieve freshman RHP Michael Bates in the top of the first with no outs on the board.

Betts recorded career highs in innings pitched four and strikeouts five as he limited to Paladins to just one unearned run and did not give up a hit.

The Spartans were able to out hit the Paladins 12 to 6 during the game.

This game ended oddly as well, because the Paladins walked in the winning run in the bottom the ninth.

The Spartans will look to bounce back from a rough weekend series against the Citadel this weekend.

Another Southern Conference opponent, the Spartans will be battling the 2-7 bottom feeders of the conference, but the conference matchups are always difficult to predict, so the Spartans will need to bring their best game come this weekend.

Categories: madison wyker, Sports, terrence hinds