Central Michigan University Athletics
Central Michigan University
Notre Dame
Chippewas Fall At Notre Dame, 10-9
4/15/2002 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 15, 2002
NOTRE DAME, Ind. - Notre Dame overcame a 7-2 deficit and held on for a 10-9 non-conference win over Central Michigan here Monday night.
The Fighting Irish are now 22-12 for the season while the Chippewas fell to 17-13.
Notre Dame jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first when Steve Stanley doubled, went to third on a balk by the Chippewas' Jeff Opalewski and a single by Brian Stavisky.
CMU came right back in the second with a run to tie it at 1-1 when Keith Sampsell doubled over the centerfielder's head, was sacrificed to third and scored on Tim Groves bounce out.
The Irish regained the lead in the second on a solo homer by Javier Sanchez.
The Chippewas battled back with four in the third to chase starter Martin Vergara and take a 5-2 lead. Danny Gibbons doubled in two while Mike Gates and Tim Groves had run-scoring singles.
Central went to the long ball in the fourth, scoring two on a homer by Danny Gibbons (2) after Tommy Grubb reached on his third straight hit.
Control problems sent Opalewski to the dugout in the fourth inning when Notre Dame took advantage of a walk and hit batsman to go along with a couple of hits to score twice, cutting the CMU lead to 7-4. Joey Fahndrich came in with the sacks loaded and got two outs, one a run-scoring sac fly.
Fahndrich fell victim to control woes of his own in the fifth, allowing four runs on a walk, a hit batter and three hits and was removed for T.J. Johnson. A single off Johnson scored the fourth run to give Notre Dame the lead, 8-7.
The Irish scored a pair of unearned runs in the sixth to up the margin to 10-7.
Central Michigan drew within one in the top of the eighth, scoring twice. The first came in on a solo homer to left center by David Latour (4). Steve Sanfilippo followed with a double, went to third on a wild pitch and scored on Tim Bullinger's single to center.
Fahndrich picked up the loss for CMU, his record falling to 1-1. The win went to Scott Bickford (1-0) with the save going to Drew Duff.
Grubb had four hits for CMU while Gibbons drove in four runs.
The Chippewas are idle until Friday when they play a nine-inning exhibition game against the Ontario Blue Jays. CMU then plays two games at Detroit on Saturday at 1 p.m., and a single game at home on Sunday against Detroit at 2 p.m.
