Boehme's Walk-Off Single Advances Baseball in AMCC Tournament
The No. 3 Penn State Behrend baseball team swept Pitt-Bradford 6-1 and 4-3 by way of an 11th inning walk off base hit Saturday afternoon to advance to the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC) semifinals.
| Final | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | R | H | E |
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0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 2 |
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0 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 1 | X | 6 | 9 | 0 |
| Final (11) | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | R | H | E |
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0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 9 | 1 |
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1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 12 | 3 |
ERIE, Pa. – The No. 3 Penn State Behrend baseball team swept Pitt-Bradford 6-1 and 4-3 by way of an 11th inning walk off base hit Saturday afternoon to advance to the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC) semifinals.
With two outs in the bottom of the 11th inning of game two, David Boehme (Venetia, PA/Seton-Le Salle) pushed a single to right field and John Hlavinka (Venetia, PA/Peters Township) beat the throw home to score from second to send the Lions (27-13) to the AMCC semifinals.
After an early run in the first inning by the Panthers (12-25), Behrend chipped away and added one run in the second, third and fourth inning to take a 3-1 lead. Bradford got one back in the fifth and a solo home run by Patrick James in the eighth tied the game and forced extras.
Boehme led the team in game two with three hits, while Scott Sada (Saegertown, PA/Saegertown), Hlavinka and Ian Taylor (Wexford, PA/Vincentian Academy) added two each. One of Sada's hits was a double that gave him 21 on the season, putting him two away from tying the all-time school record for a season.
Phil Myers (DuBois, PA/DuBois Central Catholic) got the start and the no decision after 7.2 very strong innings of work, surrendering seven hits and striking out three. Brandon Smail (Apollo, PA/Kiski) tossed 2.1 in relief to get a hold and Sean Rutkosky (Harborcreek, PA/Harbor Creek) threw the 11th, picking up his team leading sixth win of the season.
The Lions took game one handily. They scored two runs in the second, three in the fourth and one in the sixth to put Bradford in a hole for the rest of the series. With Behrend's ace Justin Rohrer (Harrisburg, PA/Central Dauphin), the Panthers struggled to get any offense going.
Rohrer set down the first nine batters of the game and went the distance, giving up only six hits and one run while striking out five.
Rohrer also got help from Brandon Bergstrom (Pittsburgh, PA/North Allegheny) and the rest of the defense behind him as well as a few hot bats on the offensive side of the ball. Bergstrom made countless defensive plays behind Rohrer and also went 2-for-3, a double and two runs scored.
Justin Foreman (Oakdale, PA/South Fayette) went 2-for-3 as well with an RBI base hit in each of his first two at bats. Hlavinka was the third Lion to go 2-for-3 in game one and also added an RBI.
Behrend plays No. 2 Pitt-Greensburg Thursday at 1 p.m. at host location La Roche College to start the championship round of the double elimination AMCC tournament.