BUCKEYE -- After falling to Waterloo the night before in such a devastating way, it really was of little surprise to anyone that LW looked a little hung over in their game Friday at Buckeye.  Yet, they should have won the game, but ran themselves out of a great opportunity to win it in dramatic fashion in the seventh inning.   

The game started with the two teams—both low on pitching—trading runs.  Buckeye struck first on a pair of runs on an infield single and a throwing error in the first inning.  LW responded with a three-run, opposite field home run over the 350 foot sign in left center from senior Mike Holick.  Not to be outdone, Buckeye responded with a three run homerun off the bat of conference MVP Jake Thomas to put them back on top 5-3 in the fourth. 

Not impressed, LW scored four times on two walks, a single that netted two runs off the bat of senior Cal Thomay, an RBI single from senior Zach Hausmann, and a two-out RBI double from senior Ryan Jones.  LW now led 7-5.

As has happened all year, the fifth inning bit the Longhorns and bit hard.  Thomay had been pitching well to that point, but began to quickly run out of gas.  A pair of errors opened the door for the Buckeye offense and three straight hits opened the floodgates to six runs—zero earned—on only four hits.

After going down 1-2-3 in the sixth, LW found itself in an 11-7 hole in the seventh.  Thomay doubled to lead off the inning.  Hausmann reached after striking out due to a wild pitch, and senior Billy Valletto reached on an error and suddenly LW realized that they had a good chance of making it into a game.  Confidence went higher when senior Mitch Zaharewicz rifled an RBI single to right with only one out to cut the score to 11-9.  Senior Ty Hoy was hit to load the bases, moving Zaharewicz to second representing the tying run with Valletto on third and senior Sam Myers at the plate and Holick standing on deck.

Holick would never bat.  Myers hammered the second pitch he saw into center field.  As the Buckeye centerfielder caught the ball, Valletto tagged and scored.  As the throw came to the plate, Zaharewicz, at second, waited to see if the Bucks were going to cut it.  When it was not cut, he took off for third.   He got a bad jump and was thrown out by ten feet to end the game.