LAWRENCEVILLE – For the second straight day, a strong pitching performance set the tone for the Georgia Gwinnett baseball team as Ryan Minteer gave up just one earned run over seven innings to lead the top-ranked Grizzlies to a 7-2 victory over Fisher on the second day of play at the A.I.I. Championship tournament at Grizzly Baseball Complex.
"We're in the position that we want to be in," GGC Head Coach Brad Stromdahl said. "Both of our starters so far have done a really good job pitching us through the seventh, and then the offense came in and had another really good day for us again. There's still a few things that we need to work on, but it's a win and it sets us up nicely for the rest of the tournament."
Minteer, who improved to a team-best 8-2 on the year, scattered eight hits over seven frames as the Grizzlies saw their starter rack up seven one-run innings for the second day in a row.
"I just wanted to go out today and throw as many innings as possible so I could take a little bit of stress off the relievers," Minteer explained. "My fastball had some good pop to it today, and I was locating it pretty well. It's been a while since I've thrown in a playoff game, but I just treated it like a regular start and tried to keep pounding the strike zone."
With the victory, the top-ranked Grizzlies improved to 45-10 on the season and advanced to the third day of play at the conference tournament. Meanwhile, Fisher dropped to 30-14 and was eliminated from the event.
Ty Abbott led a Grizzly offense on the day that accounted for 11 hits with a 3-for-4 showing at the plate with three runs batted in. The senior out of Milton and A.I.I. Player of the Year further padded his lead as the nation's RBI leader with 84 this season, and he also broke GGC's single-season hits record as he registered his 90th hit this year on a single in the sixth inning.
GGC wasted little time in getting things going as an error and then back-to-back Jereid Woods and Abbott singles led off the game and gave the Grizzlies the opening tally. A William Paschal groundout later in the frame made it 2-0, and things would work out in a similar fashion in the third as the trio combined for another to take the advantage out to three runs.
Woods finished 2-for-3 with a pair of walks and three scores, and Paschal ended 2-for-5 and knocked in three.
A lead-off triple from Woods led to another score in the fifth, and two Falcon errors in the ensuing frame as well as a Michael Hodorowski single in the seventh made it 7-0 before the visitors from Boston were able to push a run across in the bottom of the seventh.
Davis Adkins tossed the final two frames for the Grizzlies and gave up a pair of hits and a score.
In the day's other action, an outstanding pitching performance proved all for naught for sixth-seeded Ashford as the Saints fell 4-2 to No. 5 West Virginia Tech, and Cal State San Marcos rode a late surge to a 5-3 win over fourth-seeded Houston-Victoria.
In the Ashford game, Kevin Delzell rebounded from his performance a day ago to toss 7.2 five-hit frames, allowing four runs (two earned) with 10 strikeouts, but the story of the game for the Saints was timely hitting. The visitors from Iowa stranded double-digit runners for the second straight day and were only able to scratch across a pair of scores despite out-hitting the Golden Bears 14-5.
An Austin Ott fielder's choice and L.A. Gamo single brought home two in the eighth for CSUSM as UHV battled for a second straight night under the lights at Grizzly Baseball Complex. UHV's first two games have proven the most dramatic of the tournament so far as they've been decided by a combined three runs.
The Grizzlies will return to A.I.I. tournament play on Monday at noon against Cal State San Marcos, and the winner of the game will advance to the conference championship game at 1 p.m. on Tuesday.
###
