Baseball swept at rival Bluffton

BLUFFTON, Ohio – Against the Bluffton University Beavers, a Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference rival, the visiting Defiance College baseball team was swept in a doubleheader, 13-3 and 14-2, on Saturday at Memorial Field.

Bluffton raced out to a 9-0 lead after four innings in the first game before Defiance scored once in the sixth and twice in the seventh. The contest ended when the Beavers put together a four-run seventh.

Defiance was outhit by a 12-7 margin and guilty of two of the game's three errors. BU had six extra-base hits to the Yellow Jackets' two.

Lucas Thomeier went 2 for 3 with a double, walk and stolen base for DC while Colin Minner also collected two hits in three at-bats with a run batted in. Lane Good chipped in with a two-run double.

In the pitching department, Defiance starter Will Bohlman took the loss after striking out one over two innings.

The Yellow Jackets got out to a 1-0 advantage in the second contest but Bluffton exploded for 10 runs in the bottom of the first, eight of which were unearned. DC scored another run in the fourth inning before the hosts pushed across five runs in the fourth to establish a 15-2 lead. In the fifth inning. Defiance got three runs back and the Beavers scored once before the game concluded in the seventh.

BU had a 14-8 edge in hits and each squad committed two errors. Three of Bluffton's hits were home runs while the Yellow Jackets managed only one extra-base hit, a double.

Thomeier again paced the DC offense by going 2 for 3 with a walk while Minner was 2 for 4 with a pair of runs scored. Nate Kaffenbarger doubled and had an RBI while Zach Johnson produced a two-run single and walked.

Michael Reese started on the mound for Defiance and suffered the loss while recording one strikeout. Freshman John Hammerstein threw 1.1 scoreless innings with two strikeouts while Kole Small struck out one in a shutout inning.

The Jackets slip to 4-15 overall and in conference play while the Beavers are 6-13. DC is slated to play an HCAC game at Earlham College on Wednesday. First pitch is set for 6 p.m. in Richmond, Indiana.