On a day in which six seniors were recognized for their contributions to the program, the John Carroll baseball team collectively brushed off a shaky game one performance to earn a split with perennial power Marietta College Saturday at Schweickert Field.

Marietta took game one, 7-5, before the Blue Streaks rallied for a 3-2 nightcap win.

Derek Penman, John Bondi, Carter Semancik, Nate Wenson, Dom Mittiga, and Patrick Keohane all were honored before the game. The team effort honored them during and after, keeping the Blue Streaks' postseason hopes alive.

Game One
A lot was riding on a doubleheader today between Marietta and John Carroll.  Freshman starter Mitch Midea took the hill looking to advance the Blue Streak margin over the Pioneer's who came into today just 2 games behind the Blue Streaks.

After trading the lead back and forth in the early part of the game, the Blue Streaks clung onto a 3-2 lead after Aaron Zawadzki drove in Derek Penman from third base.

Once Midea excited in the sixth, Henry Haracz was called on to complete the inning, which he did effectively.  Haracz ran into trouble in the seventh, but escaped the inning by only allowing one run to make the score tied at 3-3.

"Marietta is always a sound team" said coach Ryan Nordquist and, "It even says that in our scouting report.  We have to limit the mistakes or else they'll take advantage of them."

John Carroll couldn't limit the mistakes at the end of game one, their main issue was the back part of the bullpen and mental errors.  These allowed Marietta to take advantage of them and increase their lead by 4 runs to bring the total to 7-3.

Senior day saw the seniors for the Blue Streaks come up big in the final inning at the plate.  Pat Keohane continued his record breaking season, by going 5-5 at the plate, including a ninth inning single to start a rally.

After senior Derek Penman singled to have Keohane advance to second, senior Dom Mittiga tripled to right center, scoring his fellow seniors.  The rally was cut short and the game ended with a 7-5 Marietta advantage.

Game Two
Andrew Steele got the ball in game two to be the stopper.  Steele had a gutsy high wire balancing act on the mound but, did his job.  Over his 5.1 innings pitched, Steele gave up 10 hits, but only one earned run.  Steele also had 5 strikeouts to his credit, left when the Marietta lead was 2-1.

Once Steele left, a collection of John Merrill and Erich Payne keep the Pioneer bats at bay until Nick Michel had his best performance of the season.

In the seventh inning, the Blue Streaks loaded the bases with one out and after one batter struck out, Mike Anderson had his most impactful at-bat of the year.  Anderson battled in the box and drew a critical walk that drove in the game-tying run.

Michel came into the eighth and got a double play to end the inning with multiple runners on base, prompting him to pump his fist and his teammates on the bench got up and greeted him with enthusiasm at the first base foul line.

That enthusiasm continued on in the next half of the inning.  Dom Mittiga walked and then stole second to force Marietta to intentionally walk Aaron Zawadzki to set up first and second to keep the double play alive.

The hard swinging David Ferguson came to the plate and delivered.  Ferguson roped a ball down the left field line to score Mittiga and give the Blue Streaks their first lead in game two.

Michel came back out to pitch the ninth inning and was still in command.  Going three up and three down, including striking out the final batter of the game to give the Blue Streaks a critical 3-2 home conference victory.

John Carroll holds onto their third place position in the OAC and moves to a record of 22-12 and 9-5 in conference.

"We're ready" said senior Patrick Keohane after going 6-8 on the day, and "We look forward to the challenges ahead to allow us to finish the season strong."

John Carroll will play their final home game against Wooster on Thursday May 2nd, but not before going to Case Western Reserve to play Tuesday.  John Carroll has four remaining conference games, two against Otterbein and two against Baldwin Wallace.