Baseball Bounces Back With 11-1 Home Win Over Cleary

Tuesday, April 16

Mount Pleasant, Mich.

3 p.m.

Central Michigan University

12-25

Cleary

12-22

Cleary

Central Michigan

Photo by: Jack Reeber '23,M'25 - @jackreeber.raw

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Jackson, Loikits drive in two runs apiece; 6 CMU pitchers combined to strike out 13

By: Andy Sneddon

MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. – Drew Loikits and Marquis Jackson had two hits and drove in two runs apiece on Tuesday as the Central Michigan baseball team downed Cleary, 11-1, in a nonconference game on Keilitz Field at Theunissen Stadium.

The Chippewas, who go to Central Florida for a three-game nonconference series next weekend, collected 15 hits against the NAIA Cougars (12-22) in rebounding after dropping all three games in a Mid-American Conference series at first-place Bowling Green over the weekend.

Six CMU pitchers combined to limit the Cougars to six hits and Cleary's lone run, which was unearned, came on a fifth-inning double steal.

"At the end of the day, you look at the score, 11-1 and you're trying to prevent runs," said CMU coach Jake Sabol, whose staff walked six and hit three batters. "Even though it wasn't as clean as we might want, nine free bases total, our guys, they're trying to be better than that.

"Some of these guys, they just need to go out there and put up zeros from the run standpoint to give themselves confidence. That's really their goal right now. So small steps, and they've got to be out there, and they've got to be having success in order to feel that.

"As a pitching staff we know that lately there's been some things that we've struggled with and pounding the zone and executing strikes has been one of those things. We're just trying to get a little bit better in that category."

Freshman right-hander Jake Brown (2-1) started and got the win. He allowed three hits, walked two and struck out six over four innings. Jonah Milchuck, Trevor Busyn, Jack Bach, Jack Bell and Carter Campau pitched in relief.

The six Chippewa hurlers combined to strike out 13.

"It was nice to be able to get a few guys in there, get a guy like Bell back after a long road to recovery (from injury)," Sabol said. "Some of these guys, we're going to need on weekends down the stretch, and it was nice to see Jonah Milchuck throw some strikes and continue to be competitive for us. At the end of the day, one run, yeah I'll take that."

The Chippewas scored at least one run in six of their eight turns at the plate.

Loikits got CMU on the board with a two-out, two-run single in the first inning and then Jackson scored on a throwing error – one of six miscues committed by the Cougars on the day – in the second to make it 3-0. Nick Dardas was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded in the third to up the lead to 4-0.

The Chippewas took advantage of two Cleary errors to score two unearned runs in the fifth to extend their lead to 6-1, and then they added three more in the sixth on a Dardas RBI double, a Jackson run-scoring single, and a Danny Wuestenfeld RBI double, making it 9-1.

CMU completed the scoring in the eighth on back-to-back sacrifice flies by Spencer Verburg and Jackson.