Temple University Athletics
Comeback Falls Short In 6-3 Loss To Xavier
4.21.07 | Baseball
April 21, 2007
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AMBLER, PA - Trailing 4-0 after six innings, Temple scored three runs to make it interesting but Xavier added two insurance runs in the ninth to ensure the series victory with a 6-3 win on Saturday at Skip Wilson Field. Senior Dan Brady had three hits, while sophomore Sean Barksdale extended his hitting streak to 18 games with an eighth-inning single.
Playing in front of the largest crowd of the season thanks to Cherry and White Day at the Ambler Campus, the Owls fell behind 4-0 after six. Junior starter Tom Dolan had a no-hitter through four innings, but Adam Lipski, who had four hits on Friday, greeted the southpaw with a solo homerun to start the fifth. XU added another run in the frame on a two-out, Texas League single to center by Matt Waskerwitz. The next inning, the Musketeers plated two runs on a two-run single by Robbie Kelly.
Freshman Kyle Monahan replaced Dolan in the seventh but ran into trouble and left classmate Matt Blackburn with the bases loaded and one out. The rookie was calm under pressure, inducing a groundball to first that cut down the run at home and struck out clean-up hitter Chris Lozan to end the inning.
Temple took advantage of the momentum, scoring two in the bottom half of the inning. Brady singled with one out, moved to second on a ground-out and scored on junior Devon Swope's two-out double. Xavier starter Charlie Leesman then walked sophomore Jamie Abercrombie and hit classmate Steve Mury to load the bases.
A plunking to freshman Matt Heltz drove in a run and led to a pitching change for the Musketeers as Mark Janszen replaced Leesman. He recorded a strikeout for the final out of the frame to kill the TU rally.
The Owls drew within one with an unearned run in the eighth. Barksdale singled with one out and scored all the way from first when Brady reached on a throwing error by the Xavier third baseman. After a groundout, Swope reached on a walk but Abercrombie's screaming line-drive was right at XU leftfielder Pat Coffey.
Xavier (19-20, 12-2 A-10) scored a pair of insurance runs in the ninth to complete the scoring.
Dolan (4-4) suffered the loss after surrendering four earned runs in six innings. Leesman (3-3) picked up the win after giving up two earned runs in 6.2 innings. Zac Richard recorded his fifth save with a perfect ninth.
Lipski and Adam Pasano had two hits for Xavier, who has won seven straight games and with Charlotte's 7-1 loss to Dayton today, moves into a three-way tie with Richmond for first place in the league.
The loss was Temple's fifth in a row in Atlantic 10 play. The Owls (12-24, 4-10) will play the 2,500th game in program history tomorrow in the series finale at 1 PM. Temple has a 1,346-1,120-33 record since 1927.
