@NCBearsBaseball Drops Game to Air Force

Tuesday, April 7

Greeley, Colo.

3:00 pm

University of Northern Colorado

9-17

Air Force

15-16

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Runs R	Hits H	Errors E
Air Force	2	0	0	1	0	0	4	3	2	12	20	0
Northern Colorado	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	0	0	3	5	3

Photo by: Dean Popejoy

4/7/2015 7:50:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

Northern Colorado baseball falls to Air Force in the second of four mid-week games

By: Ryan Pfeifer, UNCBears.com

GREELEY— In the second of four mid-week games with Air Force, Northern Colorado baseball fell to the Falcons 12-3 Tuesday afternoon in Greeley.

Air Force used a big offensive day and solid pitching to beat the Bears. They out hit UNC 20-5 and rode a strong start from Steven Trojan who went four innings giving up only one hit while sitting down the first 10 batters he faced.

"We came out of a great weekend series against New Mexico State last weekend, and just did not play our best game today," head coach Carl Iwasaki said. "We were right in this game until those later innings when they put up the big numbers on us."

Air Force struck early with back-to-back hits to open the game that both ended up scoring. The Falcons were held to just those two runs though, leaving two men stranded.

The Bears entered the seventh inning down 3-0 when Air Force's offense struck it hot putting up nine runs in the final three innings.

In the seventh inning the Falcons scored four runs on five hits, leaving the bases loaded. The first six batters in the inning reached base before Northern Colorado recorded its first out.

During the bottom of the seventh UNC scratched its way back into the game, scoring three runs of their own. The rally got started by senior a Jensen Park (Kaneohe, Hawaii) double followed by a Nick Tanner (Foothills Ranch, Calif.) single.

Park would get two of the team's five hits while scoring the first run.

Dan Reese (Casper, Wyo.) was then hit by a pitch to load the bases. Marco Castilla (Littleton, Colo.) brought home Tanner on a single after Park scored on a passed ball.

Reese later scored on a Cole Maltese (Superior, Colo.) double.

Air Force responded in the eighth with three runs of their own. They tacked on two more runs for good measure in the ninth.

After seeing his pitching struggle late, Iwasaki turned to senior Joe Love (Danville, Calif.) to get the final two outs. It was Love's first time in his collegiate career on the mound. He got a pop out to first and then struck out Tyler Zabojnik to end the top half of the ninth.

"I threw a couple bullpens over the fall and spring just in case a situation like this came up," Love said. "I used to pitch in high school, so it wasn't anything new for me. I just want to do whatever I can to help the team out."

"Joe coming in and getting those final outs was big for us," Iwasaki said. "He really helped us getting us out of this game by not having to use any of our weekend arms."

UNC will now continue WAC play this weekend when they travel to Arizona to face Grand Canyon. The series starts at 7:30 p.m. MDT on Friday, April 10.

"Conference play is always the most important play," said Iwasaki. "Grand Canyon is a tough team and ahead of us right now in the standings, this is a series that can really help us build some more confidence and move us closer to our goal of making the conference tournament in May."