Marshalltown, IA—The Marshalltown Community College baseball team bounced back from a game one set back to drop Muscatine Community College 11-3 in Iowa Community College Athletic Conference (ICCAC) play on Saturday at Shawn Williams Field. The Cardinals stole game one 8-1.
In the opening weekend of conference play, Muscatine jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the first inning off of MCC stating pitcher Elijah Wood (Washington, IA/Washington Community). Muscatine extended its lead to 5-0 in the second before MCC finally got on the board in the third thanks to an RBI-double from Bennett Lopez (Dorado, PR/PRBA) that scored Anderson Villarroel (Caracas, Venezuela/U.E. Santisima Caridad).
The run proved to be all the offense the Tigers could put together as MCC put just three players on base over the final four innings to drop the conference-opener. Villarroel finished the game 2-4 at the plate.
MCC reversed roles with the Cardinals in game two with the Tigers taking a 5-0 lead in the first inning. Patience paid off for the Tigers as the first five batters of the game were walked and eventually came around to score to spark the offense. Bryan Ventura's (Carolina, PR/Next Level America) run-scoring double scored Hunter Embray (Knoxville, IA/Twin Cedars) to cap the first-inning scoring.
Muscatine strung together three hits and three runs in the second inning to cut into the MCC lead, but the Tiger pitching staff of Wyatt Stark (Mt. Pleasant, IA/Fairfield) and Jorge Michael (Caracas, Venezuela/Claret) held the Cardinals without a run the rest of the way.
Bennett Lopez doubled to score Villarroel in the sixth and Pedro Lopez (Naples, FL/Naples) singled in the seventh to score Ventura to round out the scoring.
Bennett Lopez and Ventura each produced two hits while Alexis Melendez (Trujillo Alto, PR/IBAHS) and Trevor Swartz (Fremont, IA/Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont) added two RBI each in the win.
Stark was credited with the win after tossing four innings, his second of the year, while Michael pitched three scoreless innings of relief, striking out four batters.
The two teams resume play tomorrow with a doubleheader set for a 12:00 PM start at Shawn Williams Field.
