Pitching powers Wave to regional final
June 1, 2008
Sunday, June 01, 2008By Nakia Hogan
TALLAHASSEE, FLA. — Shortstop Josh Prince snagged a line drive and catcher Jared Dyer sprinted to the mound to put a big bear hug on relief pitcher Preston Claiborne. Their Tulane teammates rushed to get their turn at slapping Claiborne on the back.
It was a bit early for a full-fledged celebration. But this one felt good.
The Green Wave’s Matt Petiton and Claiborne combined for a three-hit hitter as Tulane defeated Bucknell 4-1 Saturday night in the winners’ bracket game of the NCAA Tallahassee Regional at Howser Stadium.
“This is just a good win for us,” Tulane Coach Rick Jones said. “This is our fourth regional final in the past five years. So it’s not unchartered territory for us to be where we are, but it is for a lot of these players. It was good to see us play the way we did today, knowing what was riding on it. Still, we know that we have a very, very tough challenge ahead of us.”
Tulane is in the driver’s seat of this double-elimination regional.
This is the fourth time the Green Wave has opened a regional with consecutive victories. And each time it has advanced to the Super Regional. Tulane also started 2-0 in 2001, 2004 and 2005.
The path to a super regional this season is a bit clearer, but it certainly isn’t an easy one. At 6 p.m. tonight, Tulane will play the winner of the Bucknell-Florida State game, which is at noon.
The Green Wave needs a victory to advance to a super regional. If Tulane loses tonight, it will play again at 6 p.m. Monday.
“We are one win away,” Tulane center fielder Anthony Scelfo said. “We don’t have to win three or four, we don’t have to worry about Omaha. All we have to do is win one game. It’s a great situation to be in.”
Claiborne helped the cause for the Green Wave (39-20-1). In perhaps the best outing of his Tulane career, he entered the game in the sixth inning and worked the Green Wave out of trouble.
Claiborne pitched 3 2/3 innings, allowing just one hit. He struck out four and walked none on his way to his third save of the season. Petiton (7-1) started and pitched 5 1/3 innings, yielding two hits, striking out two and walking five.
“I knew I was coming in a big situation,” Claiborne said. “I’m a reliever, that’s what we got to do. . . . There was nothing that could have distracted me. It was just Jared (Dyer) and the mitt. I just tried to hit that mitt as many times as I could.”
Freshman Rob Segedin put the Green Wave ahead 2-0 with a two-run single in the third inning, and ended a 16-inning scoreless streak by Bucknell pitchers (30-23-2).
An inning later, Scelfo smoked a two-run triple to left-center field, bringing home Josh Prince, who reached on a bloop single, and Scott Powell, who walked.
Petiton worked his way out of a potentially dangerous fifth inning. He opened the inning by walking the first two batters — Chris Pieper and Ed Rubbo. After a sacrifice bunt that advanced the runners to third and second base, Petiton hit Ben Allen, loading the bases with only one out.
But the Bison couldn’t take advantage. Petiton scrambled to get the next hitter, Dane Grandizio, to pop up in the infield. And then he got Mark Angelo to fly out to center field.
Petiton was in trouble again in the sixth inning. This time Jones didn’t allow him the chance to work his way out.
After getting the leadoff batter in the sixth to fly out to left field, Petiton walked the next two. And Jones replaced him with Claiborne, who got Austin Turban to fly out for the second out.
Claiborne then struck out Rubbo on a wild pitch, and Andrew Brouse scored, closing the margin to 4-1 before the inning ended one batter latter on a groundout to shortstop.
In the eighth inning, Tulane encountered more trouble following a throwing error by Segedin that left the Bison with runners at first and second base with no outs.
Again, the Green Wave came through. Claiborne induced Shawn Hirsch into a ground ball to Prince at shortstop. Prince tossed the ball to second baseman Seth Henry, for an out, and Henry threw to first for the double play.
Claiborne put an end to the inning one batter later by striking out Turban.
“They had quality pitching from both their pitchers,” Bucknell Coach Gene Depew said. “We obviously needed more than three hits to win a ball game. We had a lot of opportunities earlier in the game. We had some bases on balls and just couldn’t get the hit when we needed at the right time.”
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