YSU stuns Wright State again

Penguins earn another trip to NCAA tourney

Staff report

Mequon, Wis.

The Youngstown State University baseball team (16-36) will be making a return appearance in next weekend’s NCAA Tournament.

For the second time in three days, the sixth-seeded Penguins defeated top-seeded Wright State to win the Horizon League tournament. YSU rallied for two runs in the ninth inning for Saturday’s 5-4 victory at Kapco Park.

The Penguins earned the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. The Penguins will play in the field of 64 for the second time in school history. The first time was in 2004.

“We fought back and closed it out,” YSU head coach Steve Gillispie said. “It’s a great testament to their character and ability to play to the end.

“We haven’t always played well, but we’ve always continued to play hard,” Gillispie said. “We never gave up when a lot of teams could have with the way our season was going.

“I’ve been blessed that I’ve been part of this three previous times as an assistant coach. It’s a fantastic event, and I can’t be more excited to share it with this group of players.”

The Penguins entered the postseason as the lowest seed and took the tournament by storm. They opened the week by beating No. 3 Valparaiso, 7-3, on Wednesday, and they took down No. 1 Wright State, 7-1, on Thursday.

The Penguins kept their upset streak alive by beating No. 4 Milwaukee, 11-5, on Friday in the winners bracket final.

Phil Lipari (Poland) was named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player after going 3-for-5 against the Raiders.

“Over the last three weeks, he’s been as productive as a player can be,” Gillispie said. “It comes from a lot of hard work on his part, and he’s definitely been a leader for this team offensively and defensively.”

David Saluga (Hermitage, Pa.) also had three hits.

Joining Lipari on the All-Tournament Team were Jeremy Quinlan (Brookfield), Josh White, Shane Willoughby and Matt Sullivan.

The Penguins took a 3-2 lead in the seventh inning on Lipari’s RBI single.

The Raiders rallied for two runs in their next at-bat and sent Joey Hoelzel (Canfield), the Horizon’s co-Pitcher of the Year), to the mound. He allowed two unearned runs in the ninth inning to take the loss.

In that frame, Kevin Hix reached base on a one-out infield single, and Willoughby reached on an error. Lorenzo Arcuri walked to load the bases for Lipari, who made one of his rare outs with an infield pop-up.

Alex Larivee delivered a clutch RBI single that scored Hix with the tying run.

Willoughby scored the eventual winning run when Brent Gillespie was hit on the foot by a 2-2 pitch.

Lipari led off the game with a single, and he scored the first run of the contest on Sullivan’s sacrifice fly three batters later. Lipari made a great slide to the front edge of the plate to elude the tag of catcher Sean Murphy.

Wright State tied the score in the bottom half of the first when Jeff Limbaugh hit a one-out solo homer.

The Penguins faced their first deficit of the tournament in the fourth inning as Wright State scored a run on three singles.

Jack Van Horn, making his first career start for Wright State, settled in after the third inning and retired the final seven batters he faced.

He allowed a single to Lipari to start the third, but Lipari was erased when Larivee lined into a double play with the hit-and-run on. Van Horn then surrendered a two-out single to Gillespie before starting his stretch of seven straight outs.

The Penguins regained the lead in the seventh with a pair of two-out runs.