By Chris McCree

Writer

The baseball team dropped four of five to Marist and Lafayette in a homestand last weekend, with three of the losses coming against its Patriot League rival.

During the weekend’s four-game series, the Orange and Blue were outscored 24-to-21 by Lafayette and quickly fell to a League record of 1-3. To add to the struggles, the Bison fell to Marist 13-1 to finish up their five-game home-stand. Against the Red Foxes, the Bison never found their groove, going through eight different pitchers and serving up 16 walks.

“Obviously this week did not go the way that we wanted it to g,o as we are trying to repeat as Patriot League Champions,” Trey Frahler ’11 said. “We made too many mistakes, and they were able to capitalize on them.”

The Bison got off to a slow start, losing 11-5 during the first of two games on Saturday. The team fell behind 7-0 after the top of the fourth, but pulled within two before the Leopards tacked on four more insurance runs.

Game two was a completely different story as the Bison recorded 11 runs of their own and received an impressive pitching performance by Ryan Ebner ’12 to record their only win of the week 11-2. Ebner continued his string of impressive outings by going seven innings and allowing just two runs to claim his fourth victory of the year. Offensively, the Bison outhit the Leopards 15-5 thanks, in large part, to impressive individual performances by Bob Donato ’12 and Matt Lamore ’12 who combined for seven hits and six RBIs.

The Orange and Blue followed this strong offensive performance by outhitting the Leopards 17-16 during Sunday’s doubleheader, but still lost both games. During game three’s 5-2 loss, Gerry Runyan ’12 had a team-high three hits, but the team fell behind early and never fought their way back. Similarly, in game four, the Bison couldn’t overcome an early four-run deficit and lost 6-3.

“As much as it is tough to start going 1-3, we have not lost our confidence,” Frahler said. “We know now that we have our work cut out for us. One of our goals was to win every series in the regular season and post-season, but now we are going to have to work even harder to come dig ourselves out of this hole.”

The Bison will continue Patriot League play this weekend as they travel to Holy Cross for an important four-game series. Although it is still early in Patriot League play, a loss to the last-place Crusaders would be a serious hit to the Bison’s title chances.

“Our team in the past few years has done a great job at rebounding after tough weekends, and we plan on doing that this weekend and the rest of the year,” Frahler said.