Vero Beach, FL—Freshman Juan Carlos Gonzalez (Piedra Blanca, Dominican Republic/Salome Urena de Henrriquez) picked up his third win of the season as the Marshalltown Community College Baseball team defeated University of Connecticut-Avery Point 4-0 on Wednesday, but the Tigers fell in their final game of their southern trip 4-1 to Massasoit Community College at Historic Dodgertown.
Gonzalez got the Tigers off to a strong start to open the day as the freshman allowed just four hits in six innings while striking out nine batters. The offense backed up the solid outing with two runs in the fourth after Bennett Lopez (Dorado, PR/PRBA) and Enmanuel Lopez (Santiago, Dominican Republic/Prepara) both scored on errors. MCC added two more runs in the sixth after Bryan Ventura (Carolina, PR/Continental) drove in Luis Duran (Fremont, IA / Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont) and Tony Salato (Knoxville, IA/Knoxville).
Sophomore Trevor Swartz (Fremont, IA/Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont) closed out the game in the seventh inning to earn his first-career save.
MCC scored the first run of game two against Massasoit after Salato drove in Logan Holtz (Urbana, IA/Center-Point Urbana) in the second inning. The Warriors capitalized on costly MCC errors in the fifth, scoring three runs and added another in the sixth inning to take the win.
Sophomore Austin Gridley (Fairfield, IA/Fairfield) struck out five batters in four innings and sophomore JD Barr (South Sioux City, NE/Bishop Heelan Catholic) allowed one unearned run in two innings of relief.
The Tigers (10-7) finish the trip 3-2 and return home to take on Southwestern Community College at Shawn Williams Field on Saturday afternoon. First pitch is set for 1:00 PM.
