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Championship Central |
Tournament Bracket
OZARK, Missouri – Bellarmine University used a strong pitching rotation and discipline at the plate to defeat the University of Illinois Springfield 4-3 Sunday in the 2019 Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC) Baseball Championship final at U.S. Baseball Park in Ozark, Missouri.
The seventh-seeded Knights (33-19) won their fourth GLVC Championship and first since 2013, having also picked up titles in 1980 and 1989. The win also earns Bellarmine the Conference’s automatic qualifying bid for the NCAA Championship, which begins with regional action next week.
Bellarmine becomes just the second No. 7 seed to win the GLVC Championship, as Drury University first accomplished the feat in 2015. The Knights earned the 2013 title as the sixth seed.
Bellarmine did not take control of the game until earning its first lead in the eighth inning. In fact, UIS jumped on the Knights early in the first inning with a 2-0 advantage before Bellarmine even had a chance to bat. The Knights responded in the bottom half of the first when Jacob Mulcahy tripled to right field to score two teammates and knot the score at 2-2.
Illinois Springfield would benefit in the second inning from a Bellarmine throwing error on Zach Abfall’s fielder choice, which scored Nick Mayerhofer to give the Prairie Stars a 3-2 lead.
After a scoreless third inning, the Knights would respond in similar fashion as a UIS throwing error allowed Clayton Mehlbauer to cross the plate and tie the game at 3-3.
Scoring would subside until the eighth inning when Bellarmine loaded the bases with two outs and saw Matt Higgins draw in the game-winning run on a walk.
On the mound, Bellarmine’s Shane Barringer went the first 3.0 innings, giving up three runs on six hits with a strikeout. Jacob Nagel then gave the Knights a solid 2.2 innings of two-hit ball before Eddie Mathis, who was the Knights’ starting pitcher to open the tournament, came in and closed out the final 3.1 innings with three strikeouts, while allowing just one hit. Mathis picked up the win and improved to 10-2 on the season.
UIS (37-15-1) sent Brayden Jensen to the mound for the first 4.0 innings and then followed with five additional pitchers in the championship battle. Nick Alvarado, the game’s fourth pitcher, dropped to 1-4 on the year with the loss following his 0.2 innings pitched.
At the plate, Higgins went 2-for-4 and had the game-winning walk for Bellarmine, while Chris Monroe led UIS with a 3-for-4 effort with one run scored.
Both Bellarmine and Illinois Springfield will learn of their upcoming NCAA Midwest Regional opponents later this evening as the NCAA Division II Championship Selection Show airs on NCAA.com at 10 p.m. ET.