March 29, 2003

Final Stats

Greenville, S.C. - Western Carolina scored two runs in the top of the ninth without the benefit of a base hit to claim a 6-5 win at Furman Saturday night. The Catamounts, who got two-run home runs by both Rod Goldston and Alan Beck, improve to 20-8, 10-1 in the Southern Conference, while Furman falls to 11-13, 3-8 SoCon.

In the process, WCU senior Ryan Foster, who pitched the ninth, picked up his fifth save of the season and the 20th of his career to tie Mike Manning and David R. Robinson for the WCU all-time lead.

The Catamounts started the ninth with a leadoff walk by designatted hitter Jimmy Cochran, who was lifted in favor for speedy Matt Nelson as a pinch runner. Brian Sigmon followed with a walk and the two moved up 90 feet on a double steal. After a strikeout, Greenville, S.C., native Todd Roper hit a fly ball to center, allowing Nelson to score the tying run and Sigmon to move to third. The Cats pushed the winning run across the plate when Furman relief pitcher David Mitchell threw a wild pitch.

In the bottom half, Furman's Nick Wadja welcomed Foster with a leadoff walk and advanced to second on a balk. A.J. Davidiuk followed with an single up the middle, but WCU shortstop Wayne Kilmer kept the ball in the infield, leaving runners on the corners. Brandon Barrett laid down a sacrifice bunt to advance Davidiuk and Foster struck out Stephen Hildreth. The Cats then intentionally walked Derek Norman to load the basses with two outs. Foster got Jon Stallsmith, who had entered the game after Furman's top hitter Dominik Frankey was lifted earlier in the game for a pinch runner, to ground out to third to end the game.

Furman took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first. Leadoff batter Clint Hill laced the first pitch he saw down the left field line for a triple and scored on an RBI ground out by Norman. However, the Cats answered with two runs in the top of the second. Todd Buchanan got a leadoff double and Goldston followed with a two-run homer to right for his first round-tripper of the season.

The Paladins answered in the bottom of the second with two runs, making the score 3-2. Furman started the frame with three straight hits to scores one run, including a leadoff double by Sam McLain, a single by Case Cassedy and an RBI single by Cole Hubka. After a walk loaded the bases, Seth Foster got three ground balls to end end the frame, however the ground out by Hill allowed a run to score.

The see-saw battle continued in the top of the third as Chris Davis walked to start the frame and, two batters later, Beck hit a two-out, two-run home run deep over the left-center field fence to make the score 4-3 in WCU's favor.

Furman took advantage of two Catamount errors in the fourth and one in the fifth to take a 5-4 lead. Wajda reached on fly ball to right in the fourth, which was dropped, and later scored with two outs on a ball which got past the WCU third baseman to plate Wadja. In the fifth, first hitter Hildreth reached on a throwing error on a ground ball to third and later scored on an RBI sacrifice fly by Frankey.

Beck, Buchanan and Davis led the way for WCU , each collecting two hits. Brian Barnes (3-3) got the win in relief, pitching two innings and allowing just two hits.

Norman and Frankey each had two hits for Furman. Coogie Freedman (0-2) took the loss, giving up two runs and three walks in 0.2 innings.

Western Carolina and Furman will complete the three-game set on Sunday (Mar. 30) with first pitch set for 1 pm at Furman Baseball Stadium.