By CAMERON BOON
WEBSTER, N.Y. — Caleb Lang (Cairn) used his experience in playing Lancaster Bible College to his advantage, scoring the tying run and then driving in the winning run in the Niagara Power’s 2-1 victory over the Rochester Ridgemen in New York Collegiate Baseball League action Thursday night at Basket Road Field.
Lang finished the night only 1-for-3, but the one hit was a big one. He tripled to the left field fence to lead off the fourth inning and scored on a Mason Irby (Jones County JC) single to right that tied the game at one at that point.
His sacrifice fly in the seventh scored Ethan Hurt (Trevecca Nazarene) from third to give the Power their 2-1 lead they would not relinquish.
“I’m just looking for a pitch that’s elevated so I can hit it someplace in the outfield,” Lang said about his approach to that at bat.
Niagara also had a great pitching outing from AJ Bruner (Trinity International), who earned his first win of the season.
The Evansville, Indiana native went eight strong innings, allowing only one run on four hits while striking out three Ridgemen batters.
“His two-seam really had a lot of action and he got a lot of ground balls,” Niagara head coach Josh Rebandt said of his starter. “He pitched really efficiently and got ahead of a lot of hitters.”
The two-seam was his go-to pitch, getting Rochester to record 14 groundball outs, and no errors helped out their pitching staff.
The Ridgemen also got a good pitching performance. For the third consecutive game, the starter went the distance as Zach Leonard (Lancaster Bible) went all nine innings, scattering seven hits while striking out nine hitters.
“I thought he pitched really well. He was in the strike zone and had batters off-balance all night long,” Rochester manager Joe Schallenberger said.
The Ridgemen scored first for the third consecutive game, tacking on a run in the second inning courtesy of Devan O’Bryan (St. Louis CC Meramec).
Tage Johnson (Houghton) led off the inning by getting hit in the back with a pitch and advanced to second on a wild pitch.
Johnson scored on O’Bryan’s single to left center field. He then tried stretching it to a double, but was tagged out on the play.
Rochester then had a chance in the bottom of the seventh inning, with Johnson and O’Bryan starting the inning with base hits. After a sacrifice bunt moved them up to second and third with one out, the Ridgemen looked as if they were primed to take the lead.
But neither Bruner nor Rebandt worried.
“I could see it in his eyes that he wanted it,” Rebandt said after going out to visit his pitcher.
He wanted it, and he got it, being able to get out of the jam and preserve the then 1-1 tie.
The Ridgemen and Power will face each other yet again Friday night at Sal Maglie in the second game of this three-game set. First pitch is set for 7:00 p.m.
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