Rain didn't keep the UW-Whitewater baseball team from hosting UW-Superior on Sunday as the two teams split a pair of games. Game one ended in favor of Superior by a score of 10-0 and game two finished 11-2 in favor of the 'Hawks. Both games were shortened for different reasons; the first game ended after eight innings by virtue of the ten-run rule and the second game ended after seven because of a consistent cold rain. Whitewater is now 18-9 overall and 10-6 in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) while Superior moves to 9-18 overall and 2-10 in the WIAC.

box score game one
box score game two

photo gallery (photos by Kristine Johnson)
 

Yellowjacket pitcher Cale Tassi kept the Warhawk bats quiet in game one as he gave up no runs on seven hits while striking out eight. Tassi, now 1-2 this season, got ten runs of support from the Superior offense en route to the shutout victory.

 

Sam Petrasko (Appleton/East) went 3x4 and Mike Kenseth (Milwaukee/West Allis Hale) went 2x2 as they were the only Warhawks to record multiple hits in the game.

 

The Whitewater bats came to life in game two while Superior's went dormant on the account of a solid pitching performance by Aaron Dott (Green Lake/Green Lake). Dott pitched seven innings giving way to only three Superior hits. Dott also struck out thirteen of the twenty-six batters he faced.

 

UW-W took a 1-0 lead immediately in the bottom of the first. Ben Kuhlmann (Minneapolis, MN/Southwest) scored on one of eight UW-Superior errors in the game. Another run in the bottom of the third gave the 'Hawks a 2-0 advantage. 

 

Superior came back to tie the game with two runs in the top of the fourth but Dott held them in check the rest of the way as they never scored again.

 

UW-W answered with three runs in the bottom of the fourth to take a 5-2 lead. They added two in the bottom of the sixth and four in the bottom of the seventh before the game was called due to weather.

 

Kuhlmann went 3x4 in the game driving in one and scoring two. Kevin Zalnis (Woodstock, IL/Woodstock) also went 3x4 while scoring two and driving in two. Max Cordio (Whitewater/Whitewater) was the only other Warhawk to record multiple hits as he went 2x3. 

 

Pending the remaining results of the rest of Sunday's WIAC match-ups, the Warhawks could find themselves atop the WIAC standings with just less than three weeks remaining in the regular season. The Warhawks have won seven of the last nine regular season titles, six outright. They most recently won the title in 2008.

 

The win on Sunday gave UW-W head coach John Vodenlich the 199^th win of his career as he has run his overall coaching record to 199-65-1 since 2004.

 

The Warhawks will host UW-Platteville on April 22 in a doubleheader beginning at 1:00 in Whitewater at Prucha Field.

John Vodenlich, UW-W head coach