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Box Score
NEWARK, New Jersey – The second-seeded University of Texas-Pan American Broncs baseball team scored four runs with two outs in the bottom of the ninth to open the Great West Conference Tournament with a 7-6 walk-off victory over the seventh-seeded New York Institute of Technology Bears on Tuesday at Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium.
The Broncs (28-28) had
Chris Torres at first and two outs in the bottom of the ninth trailing 6-3 when
Shane Ammon singled and
Bryan Ramirez hit RBI-singles to make it 6-4 to knock out starter
Ryan Dillabough.
Alberto Morales came up against
Matt Maier (0-2) and reached on an error to score a run.
Aaron Moore hit an RBI-single, and then after a
Riley Goulding infield-single laoded the bases,
Shane Klemcke walked to force-in the winning run.
The Bears (10-46) jumped out to an early lead against
Sam Street (10-3), as
Robert Loftus and
Alex Angus led off with singles, setting up a sacrifice fly by
Ali Rodriguez to make it 1-0 in the first.
Street retried the next 10 batters he faced, but in the fifth,
Michael Femin singled on the seventh pitch of his leadoff at-bat, and
Nick Sebastian followed by fouling off seven-straight pitches before striking out on the 11
th pitch of his at-bat. At 18 pitches, Street had already thrown more pitches than he had in any of the first four innings.
Nick Dellasperanza singled, and one out later,
Michael Iglesias hit an RBI-single. Loftus followed with a three-run home run to make it 5-0.
That was it against Street, who tied his career-high with 13 strikeouts while pitching his eighth complete game. He is now at 115.1 innings pitched this season, the second most by a Broncs pitcher in a season in program history. He also has 104 strikeouts, the seventh most by a Bronc in a season in program history.
The Broncs got on the board against Dillabough in the bottom of the inning. Torres and
Will Klausing led off with singles to put runners on the corners and Dillabough threw a wild pitch to score Torres and make it 5-1.
With one out in the seventh, Klausing doubled and scored on an RBI-single by Ammon to make it 5-2.
Moore launched his first-career home run in the eighth to bring the Broncs within two, but
Dan Lackner stole home with two outs in the ninth to push the Bears' lead back out to three.
The Broncs face either third-seeded Houston Baptist or sixth-seeded and host NJIT on Wednesday at 6 p.m.