May 19, 2005

Box Score

DAYTON - The Dayton baseball team overcame a four-and-a-half-hour rain delay to beat visiting Richmond, 2-1 in the opener of an Atlantic 10 Conference series Thursday at Time Warner Cable Stadium.

UD (32-21, 14-8 A-10) matched its most wins in school history for a single season with 32 and will wrap up its regular season schedule with a doubleheader against Richmond (20-31, 12-10 A-10) which has been moved to 1 p.m.

The Flyers enter the final day of their regular season needing just one victory to clinch the fourth seed in the 2005 Atlantic 10 Baseball Championships, which will be held May 25-28 at Dragons Stadium in Downtown Dayton. UD, who has already clinched a berth in the A-10 Championships, would then play in the opening game of the Tournament at noon on Wednesday.

Junior Craig Stammen improved to 8-6 on the season with his eighth complete game performance of the season. He scattered eight hits while surrendering just one run and striking out three batters. Stammen has now won seven of his last 10 starts including three in a row.

Dayton was out hit 8-5, but made the most of its offensive opportunities as it improved to 18-2 when holding its opponent to two runs or less.

A-10 Player of the Week Brandon Godzik was 2-for-2 with the game-winning RBI. Three other Flyers also singled as Joe McSoley was 1-for-2 with an RBI, Bobby Getty was 1-for-3 with the game-winning run scored and Aaron Hepner was 1-for-2.

Godzik got things started in the second inning with a one-out single up the middle. He traded places with Bryan Chandler who reached on a fielder's choice. Chandler then moved up to second on an errant throw by the Spiders' catcher on a pickoff attempt. McSoley took advantage and ripped a single up the middle to send home Chandler and give UD a 1-0 lead after two innings.

Dayton added another run in the fourth and began the frame with a single off the bat of Getty. He made his way to second on a wild pitch and then to third on a ground out. Godzik drove him home with a ground ball off the mitt of the pitcher with the infield in. The hit made its way through the right side of the infield and sent home Getty to put the Flyers on top 2-0 after four innings.

Richmond scored on a sacrifice fly with the bases loaded in the sixth, but Stammen induced a slow ground ball, which was fielded cleanly by McSoley at third and thrown on to first to end the threat with the score 2-1 in favor of UD.

Then with one out in the seventh, the Spider batter hit a line drive down the right field line that fell just out of reach from a diving Flyer outfielder and resulted in a triple. However, Stammen came through again with a pair of ground balls to short and second respectively to end the game with a 2-1 Dayton victory.