EARLY FLOOD GIVES RICE WIN OVER MARSHALL

By Mark Anderson

Saturday’s game with Marshall had a little bit of everything. It had rain, rain, and two rain delays. It featured Marshall’s “Upside Down Man” during the second rain delay. It seemed all that was lacking was a Rick Dempsey sliding across the tarp. And that was before the game even began.

When the game began, runs from Rice in the first two innings seemed a lot like the weather—a lot of them, and having Marshall worry if it would ever end. Two runs in the first, and three in the second, sparked by Jess Buenger’s homerun, was more than Marshall could handle.

Meanwhile, Matt Langwell seemed to be sticking his finger in the proverbial dam himself. Matt gave up a season-high five walks—including three in the first inning. But Langwell would get out of that jam, one that would not be the last one seen in this game. To say that Langwell wasn’t as sharp as in other outings would be putting it mildly. But in spite of not having his best stuff, and pitching through a downpour for three innings, Langwell was able to hang onto that lead.

Langwell shut out the Herd through the first two innings. But in the third, Vincent singled into the swamp known as right field tonight at Reckling Park. After a fly out, Vincent advanced to second on—drum roll, please—another walk, the fourth of the day for Langwell. But Jess Buenger’s error at second brought home Vincent to make it a 5-1 ballgame.

The fifth inning for the Owls looked very promising at the beginning, but ended on a sour note. Joe Savery led off with a single and advanced when the left fielder could not cleanly play the ball. Savery then stole third base without as much as a throw. Luna walked, and then reached second as a pitch got a way from Damas—enough to allow Luna to go to second, but not enough to score Savery from third. Lehmann was then hit by a pitch. But Chissmon struck out Henley, Buenger, and Padron to leave the bases loaded.

Four hits, a run, and four walks was all the damage that the Herd could do for the first five innings, but in the sixth, the hole in the dam was bigger than Langwell’s finger. Sanders led off with a single, and Damas walked. Ledford laid down a sacrifice bunt to move the runners up to second and third. At this point, Coach Graham strolled to the mound and called in Scott Longeran. The first batter he faced was the light hitting third baseman, who grounded out to Friday to bring the second run of the game for Marshall home. Chapman followed with a RBI double to left that made the score 5-3. An error by Padron left the door open for more, but Lape popped out to Buenger to end the threat.

In the seventh, the Thundering Herd thundered, but did not rain. Murphy led off with a single, and was replaced by pinch-runner Jamieson. Casamassima was hit by a pitch to put runners on first and second with no outs. At this point, Coach Graham emerged from a dugout and went to the mound and called in his infielders to appear to set up what would happen on the ensuing bunt.

But Jamieson got the surprise of his baserunning life as he apparently watched Savery and Padron charge hard, but was so mesmerized that he forgot to pay attention to Jess Buenger, and more particularly, Scott Longerman, who turned and threw a strike to Buenger to tag out Jamieson, who never even got back to the bag.

After Sanders grounded out to Friday, Coach Graham brought on Ryne Tacker. Tacker finished by earning the third save of the season, going 1 1/3 innings, giving up a hit and a few walks, and striking out two.