The Bowling Green baseball team dropped three games in their four-game series with Marshall this weekend.

The lone win came in the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader, 10-5. In that game the Falcons got on the board early, scoring six runs in the first three innings. Marshall came back later in the game, trimming the lead to one run by the end of the sixth inning. The Falcons responded in the bottom of the sixth with four runs.

Keith Laughlin earned his fourth Mid-American Conference win of the season and his fifth win overall. The lefty improved to 5-1 overall and 4-0 in the MAC.

David Barkholz started the Falcons off in the first inning, getting a RBI single. He was 2-for-3 in the game, with two RBIs and three runs scored. Tyler Wasserman was 2-for-4 with three RBIs. Bowling Green lost 3-2 in Saturday’s second game. Marshall scored in the top of the first and Bowling Green responded with a run of their own when Kelly Hunt’s single to left scored Barkholz. The game remained tied at one until the eighth inning.

Marshall scored two runs in the top of the eighth to lead 3-1. Bowling Green looked like they might make a comeback when Hunt hit a RBI double to score Nolan Reimold. Kevin Longstreth reached base on a walk and runners were on first and second for Wasserman. Wasserman was retired on a ground out.

Hunt’s RBI double was the 179th RBI of his career, giving him the BGSU career record. Len Elias previously held the record at 178 career RBIs.

The Falcons had four hits in the game, two off the bat of Hunt and two from Reimold.

Bowling Green’s Tyler Saneholtz pitched six innings, giving up one run off six hits and striking out eight.

Bowling Green coach Danny Schmitz talked about the plate discipline of his young team after yesterday’s loss.

“It’s been a problem all year, the discipline. We take the good ones and swing at the bad ones,” he said. “We’re far along enough now in the season that we have to start making some improvements and we’re still not making improvements.”

The Falcons lost the series finale, 12-5, yesterday afternoon at Steller Field.

“We got outplayed the whole game,” Schmitz said. “We didn’t have the pitching. We started out pretty good. We didn’t show that we were a very tough team and that’s unacceptable. We need to show some toughness, physically and mentally.”

Marshall had five home runs in the game, pounding out 17 total hits in the game.

Pitcher Tom Oestrike held the Thundering Herd scoreless through three innings, but Marshall started to heat up with back-to-back home runs in the fourth inning. Both were solo shots.

Hunt scored from second base on a throwing error in the bottom half of the inning. Hunt had reached base when he was hit by a pitch. Marshall led 2-1 though four innings.

The Herd went on to score four runs in the fifth, two runs in the sixth and four more runs over the final three innings. The Falcons scored one run in the seventh, off of Jeff Warnock’s single. Bowling Green scored three in the bottom of the ninth when Nate Henschen homered with two outs. It was his second home run of the season. The Falcons’ comeback attempt fell short as Reimold popped out to end the game.

“[Saturday’s win] gave us one game but we’re at home, we need to win series,” Schmitz said. “We’re down to three weekends left and we’re getting some help throughout the league, but we’re going to take care of our own business. [Sunday] was a big game and we didn’t show very good colors today.”

Marshall’s Grant Harper pitched a four-hit shut out in Friday’s series opener. The Herd scored in the third inning and went on to win 5-0.

Steve Raska had two of Bowling Green’s four hits and the Falcons committed four errors in the game.

The Falcons fall to 13-19 overall and 6-10 in the MAC after the weekend. Bowling Green will play Ohio State on Wednesday in Columbus for a non-conference matchup.

Falcons unable to come back; Herd tops BG, 2-1

By Chris Willig

Sports reporter

Emotions and tension were running high yesterday, when the Falcons hosted Marshall at Steller Field. The game marked the end of a four game homestand against Marshall, a series in which the Falcons were down 2-1.

Tom Oestrike got the start for the Falcons. Oestrike struck out four in his first two innings and held the Thundering Herd scoreless through three innings. However, in the fourth inning Marshall’s bats got the best of the Falcons.

With one out in the fourth inning Oestrike gave up back-to-back first pitch home runs giving the Herd an early 2-0 lead.

Intensity seemed to increase as Marshall center fielder, Joe Glevenyak rounded the bases after taking Oestrike’s first pitch, fastball deep over the left field wall. Choice words and staredowns exchanged between both teams seemed to put the Falcons over their boiling point. After the second consecutive homerun, the Falcons were fired up with no where to go.

Oestrike’s first pitch, following the homeruns, hit Marshall’s batter square in the back. The Falcons were issued a warning for the beanball and this seemed to wake up the Herd, who went on to score eight runs in the following three innings.

In the bottom of the third inning, Falcon first baseman, Kelly Hunt found himself in the retaliatory end of Marshall’s pitcher Steve Ziroli’s fastball. Both benches were warned, following the altercation and both the Falcons and the Herd seemed to be inches away from a brawl.

“We got outplayed the whole game, they hit back to back homeruns then we hit their guy and seemed to wake them up,” Falcons head coach Danny Schmitz said. “Words were exchanged between teams, then they went on to score 10 straight.”

The already intense atmosphere furthered in the later part of the game as well. Kelly Hunt’s hit, what seemed to be an innocent ground ball down the first base line, once again nearly turned into an altercation.

Hunt’s ground ball was fielded by Ziroli along the first baseline and Ziroli found himself directly in the middle of the baseline in between Hunt and firstbase. Hunt collided with the Marshall pitcher, in an attempt to reach first base, and set both teams off. The already fired up benches wasted no time in leaving the dugout, both exchanging words across the field. The umpires, however, did their best to stop the verbal onslaught before any physical altercations took place, issuing both teams another warning and sent them back inside the dugout.

Through all this, the Falcons could not seem to get on track, giving up twelve runs and they were unable to string a series of hits together until the ninth inning. The 12-5 loss for the Falcons comes right before a road trip to Columbus where they are scheduled to take on Ohio State Wednesday.