Senior goes

5-for-5 in ASU victory

By Steve Behr

DAVIDSON — A bad stroke of luck hurt Appalachian State in the first game of its Southern Conference doubleheader with Davidson Sunday. The Mountaineers made sure bad luck would not have any effect on the second game.

The Wildcats benefited when a bases-loaded Wes Hobson ground-rule double, only drove in two runs instead of three, which kept a potential ASU run off the scoreboard.

Davidson’s Chase FitzPatrick eventually belted a walk-off solo home run off Appalachian State closer Zach Quate and lifted the Wildcats to a 9-8 victory in a game that was suspended from Saturday to Sunday because of rain.

Appalachian State responded with a 15-5 victory in the second game after hitting two home runs and belting out 17 hits off seven Davidson pitchers. Mountaineers manager Chris Pollard felt that Rand Smith’s game-opening home run in the second game helped Appalachian forget about a tough loss they suffered about 20 minutes earlier.

“That home run by Rand was a really good statement,” Pollard said. “And (starting pitcher) Aubrey (Edens) battled. It was a typical Aubrey type of game. He made pitches when he had to. Sometimes he was flirting with disaster, but he made pitches when he needed to.”

The Mountaineers (9-15, 3-10 SoCon) took out their first-game frustrations on the Davidson pitching staff in game two. The middle of Appalachian State’s lineup proved to be especially destructive. Isaac Harrow, hitting third in the ASU order, was a one-man wrecking crew, going 5-for-5 in that game, hitting two doubles, driving in one run and scoring four times.

It’s the third time the senior from Hickory has gone 5-for-5 from the plate at Appalachian State.

“I’m definitely seeing the ball well right now,” Harrow, who went 2- for-4 in the first game, said. “I saw some good pitches and I’m starting to hit the ball hard.”

Chris Alessandria, hitting fifth in the order, went 3-for-4, including a three-run home run in the Mountaineers’ six-run seventh inning. Alessandria also had an RBI double in the first inning and another in the sixth, giving him five RBIs in the game.

No. 4 hitter David Towarnicky went 2-for-5 with an RBI single in the third, an RBI double in the sixth. He also scored two runs.

The Mountaineers’ table-setters did their share to provide offense. Smith led the game off with a solo home run the first inning and No. 2 batter, Wes Hobson, went 3-for-5 with two doubles— one that drove in a run in the fourth — and an RBI single in the seventh.

Jarod Faggart, hitting seventh in the order, added a solo home run in the fifth.

“Isaac came up big and I thought Wes had a good approach hitting the ball,” Pollard said. “And Alessandria had a big swing. At this time of the year, we want to get the guys at the bottom of swinging it better, but we kind of go as the top five guys in our lineup go. The top five guys in the lineup came up big for us tonight.”

It was more than enough for Edens, who worked six innings. Edens gave up four runs on five hits, including a two-run home run to Pat Brady in the fifth inning. Davidson (10-11, 5-4) scored two runs in the third inning, but just one of them was earned.

Edens turned the game over to Nick Daniels in the seventh, who tossed two scoreless innings. Daniels gave the ball to Patterson in the ninth, who closed the game out after giving up an unearned run.

“We started off pretty hot offensively when Rand hit the (home run) in centerfield,” Alessandria said. “Aubrey came out and kept us in it until we broke it open.”

Normally, a ground-rule double that bounces over the fence and drives in two runs is a positive thing. But when it cost Appalachian State an extra run, it came back to haunt the Mountaineers in the first game.

It’s not like the Mountaineers wanted to give back Hobson’s sixth- inning double, which bounced over the fence and drove in two runs. However, Hobson hit his double with the bases loaded. Had the ball stayed in the ballpark, Smith would have very likely scored from first base. Instead, Smith was forced to stop at third base and did not score later in the inning.

Davidson eventually took advantage of its “good fortune” when Chase FitzPatrick’s walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth inning beat the Mountaineers.

Three home runs accounted for five of Davidson’s nine runs in the first game. FitzPatrick drilled his walk-off, solo shot off Appalachian State closer Zach Quate, who had an ERA of 0.60 in 15 games going into Sunday. Quate had set the Wildcats down, with help from a double play, in the eighth inning and got Sam Payne to ground out to second in the ninth inning before facing FitzPatrick.

The Wildcats broke a 2-2 tie with a three-run home run by Danny Weiss and a solo home run by the next batter, Drew Gadaire, that provided four of Davidson’s five runs in the bottom of the fifth inning.

The Mountaineers answered with a three-run rally of their own, sparked by a bases-loaded walk by Smith and Hobson’s ground-rule double in the top of the sixth. Smith added a two-run home run in the eighth, which was immediately followed by a solo shot by Hobson. Both were hit off of Davidson’s standout closer Matt Webb, and tied the game 8-8.

“We really only had one bad inning,” Pollard said. “We gave up the five-run inning after we had made some good pitches earlier in the inning. We were in the process of trying to pitch around Weiss right there and we didn’t get the ball far enough out. We were willing to give up a walk on a 3-0 count and take our chances with the next guy.”

Both Smith and Hobson finished with three RBIs. Harrow added two hits and an RBI double in the first inning, which was played Saturday. Appalachian State added a run in the second when Nick DeRose scored on a Davidson error.

Davidson collected 11 hits, including three by Weiss, in game one. Weiss also had five RBIs.

The Mountaineers play at UNC Asheville Tuesday and host High Point on Wednesday before playing a three-game SoCon series at Furman beginning Friday.

Davidson 9, App. State 8
Game 1
App. St 110 003 030 — 8 8 0
Davidson 200 050 101 — 9 11 3
Andress, Jo. Dowdy (5), Quate (8) and Je. Dowdy. Middour, Lamb (5), Hunter (6), Frongello (7), Webb (8) and Freeman. W—Webb (2-0), L— Quate (0-1). LOB—ASU 9, Davidson 5. 2B—ASU, Hobson, Harrow; Davidson, Kayner, Brady, Weiss 2. HR—ASU, Smith, Hobson; Davidson, Cha. FitzPatrick, Weiss, Gadaire. SH—ASU, Smith; Davidson, Gadaire. SB— ASU, Smith, DeRose; Davidson, Kayne. CS—ASU, Harrow; Davidson Kayne.

App. State 15, Davidson 5
Game 2
App. St 201 312 600 — 15 17 2
Davidson 002 020 001 — 5 9 2
Edens, Daniels (7), Patterson (9) and Dowdy. Kennedy, Horkley (4), Frongello (5), Silwiak (6), Bass (6), Read (7), Fisher (8), Overcash (8) and Freeman. W—Edens (1-2), L—Kennedy (1-3). LOB—ASU 8, Davidson 11. 2B—ASU, Hobson 2, Harrow 2, Towarnicky, Alessandria 2; Davidson, Cha. FitzPatrick. HR—ASU, Alessandria, Faggart; Davidson, Brady. SH— ASU, Smith. SB—ASU, Harrow, Wallace. CS—ASU, Wallace. HBP—Davidson, Cha. FitzPatrick (by Edens), Payne (by Daniels).