Neosho, MO—The Marshalltown Community College baseball team suffered a pair of defeats on the road Sunday afternoon. The Tigers fell to Crowder College 4-3 and dropped a late decision to Iowa Central Community College 8-6.
Originally scheduled for a doubleheader on Saturday against Crowder, the weekend series shifted to Sunday between the three teams. MCC rallied to take a 3-2 lead over Crowder, but the Roughriders answered with a pair of late runs to steal the opener. The Tigers held another late inning lead against the Tritons only to see the lead slip away.
MCC's offense was paced by Enmanuel Lopez (Santiago, Dominican Republic/Prepara) in game one after the sophomore launched a three-run home run in the top of the fifth inning, his fifth of the year, to give the Tigers a 3-2 lead. Crowder took advantage of an MCC error in the bottom half to score two runs and held on for the win.
Diogen Ceballos (La Vega, Dominican Republic/Liceo La Roma) struck out five batters but was tagged with his first loss of the season on the mound. Jose Mieses (Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic / Prepara) collected a pair of hits in the loss, his fourth multi-hit game of the year.
Game two opened up with Iowa Central building a 3-0 lead through two innings. The third inning saw the Tiger bats come to life with five runs. Luis Duran (Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic / Centro de Estudio Espaillat) and Callen Bertrand (Grimes, IA/Dallas Center-Grimes) drove in a pair of runs each with a single in the frame to put MCC on top 5-3. Lopez came around to score in the fourth inning on a walk to extend the lead.
The Tritons got to MCC starter Juan Carlos Gonzalez (Piedra Blanca, Dominican Republic/Salome Urena de Henrriquez) in the sixth inning, scoring four runs. Iowa Central held off a late Tiger rally to hand MCC its second loss of the day.
The Tigers collected seven hits against the Tritons and drew 10 walks, but left nine runners on base. MCC has now lost six of their eight games this season by two runs or less.
The three teams resume play Monday afternoon at Crowder. MCC will take on the Roughriders at 12:00 PM and will finish the series against Iowa Central immediately after.
Pre-game look. 1:00 start at Crowder. Here we go pic.twitter.com/ZBLMEWGELi
— MCC Tiger Baseball (@MCCTigers_BB) March 12, 2017
