Spartans Sweep During Spring Break

By carolinianweb on March 14, 2018 • ( 0 )

Tripp Hurd
Staff Writer

PC: UNCG Athletics

The UNCG Baseball team completed a weekend sweep of Lafayette on Saturday afternoon at UNCG Baseball Stadium. The three game series was scheduled to finish up on Sunday; however, the threat of rain caused Sunday’s game to turn into a double-header on Saturday. The Spartans have not had any trouble producing runs this season, and that continued this weekend, as they scored a total of 32 runs over the three-game series against the Leopards. UNCG is now 11-4 in the still young season, and the team is in championship form as they are only two weeks away from the start of conference play.

Friday’s opening game was a back and forth affair through the early innings until the Spartans scored seven combined runs in the fifth and sixth, to cruise to a lopsided 14-5 victory. Game one saw pitcher Matt Frisbee go six innings, allowing four runs on nine hits against the Leopards. Frisbee was followed by Easton Welch on the mound. Welch gave up one run before being replaced by Jake Lewis, who closed out the seventh inning. Trey Kissack and Jack Ponder pitched the eighth and ninth innings respectively to close the game out for UNCG. A total of seven players got hits in the opener, with five of those going on to contribute multiple hits on Friday evening. UNCG ended up with 15 total hits on the evening. Outfielder Cesar Trejo, and Designated Hitter Tripp Shelton both hit home runs to chip in on the high scoring outing for the Spartans.

The offensive outburst continued for the Spartans into the first game of Saturday’s double-header, as they ran away from the Leopards in a 13-5 win. In the bottom of the first inning UNCG came out on fire, scoring six runs right out of the gate. The next two innings saw another six runs go up on the scoreboard for the Spartans, putting the game out of reach early. Bryce Hensley struck out eleven hitters over seven innings of action and allowed eight hits. Hensley is now 2-1 on the season. Hensley was followed on the mound by Alex Hoppe, who came out of the bullpen to hold the Leopards to a scoreless eighth inning. Alex Sova gave up three runs to start the ninth and was replaced by Jeremiah Triplett who closed out the game for UNCG.

Game two on Saturday proved to be more of a test as the bats cooled down a bit, but the Spartans managed to grind out a 5-2 victory. Jake Mayhew took the mound as the starting pitcher for UNCG and went just over three innings before Jack Maynard came in, allowing only one hit in 3.2 innings of action. Andrew Wantz came on in the eighth and closed out the last two innings, giving up only one hit. The win went to Maynard, who is now 3-1 on the year. The scoring finally slowed down for the Spartans in the third game of the series as they only managed five runs. UNCG led 3-0 before the Leopards cut into the lead to make it 3-2 in the top of the fourth inning. Tripp Shelton had a RBI in the seventh, as he batted in Cesar Trejo to increase the lead to 4-2. The Spartans added another run in the eighth to finish off the weekend sweep. Lafayette leaves Greensboro with three straight losses, dropping them to 6-9 overall on the season.

It was a very impressive series which saw the Spartans take care of business in a matchup they expected to do so in. After this homestand the Spartans will be road tripping to Rock Hill, South Carolina to face Winthrop on Wednesday at 6 p.m. The road trip continues over St. Patrick’s Day weekend in Nashville, Tennessee for a three-game series against Lipscomb.