Baseball Splits Doubleheader at Cornell

After rainy weather forced the Harvard baseball team to postpone its weekend games against Princeton and Cornell, the Crimson finally took the field on Tuesday to play its first Ivy League contests against the Big Red in Ithaca, New York.

Harvard (5-14, 1-1 Ivy) started off the day on the right foot by battling to capture a tight 6-5 victory over Cornell in ten innings. But the Big Red (9-9, 2-2) bounced back in the rubber game, earning a 6-2 victory over the visiting Crimson in order to salvage a split on the day’s action.

CORNELL 6, HARVARD 2

After taking the day’s first contest, the Crimson hoped to carry its momentum into the second game of the doubleheader.

“We had all the momentum in the world coming into that game,” junior centerfielder Mike Martin said. “We hit them hard in the first few innings.”

Unfortunately for Harvard, the team failed to take advantage of early opportunities for run production. The Crimson put itself in some good positions offensively, but, as has been the case for much of the season, the squad was unable to capitalize with runners on base. Harvard left eight men stranded on the base paths throughout the game.

“Sometimes you press too much and you try to do more than what you can do,” senior utilityman Carlton Bailey said. “That’s how baseball goes. You can have runners in scoring position every inning and not score a run.”

Things went from bad to worse when fielding errors and mistake pitches allowed the Cornell offense to plate five runs—capitalized by a three-run double from Chris Cruz—in the bottom of the third.

The Crimson attempted to claw its way back throughout the game. In the sixth inning, Martin was able to score by hitting his way on and then crossing the plate on a sacrifice fly to center field by junior catcher Ethan Ferreira.

“We were just trying to get ourselves back in the game,” Martin said. “We hadn’t been doing well hitting with runners in scoring position, and we were just looking to get going again.”

Harvard chipped away at the lead again in the eighth after junior right fielder Brandon Kregel smacked a double to left and eventually scored on a balk.

But it would all be too little, too late, as Cornell shut the Crimson down the rest of the way to seal a 6-2 Harvard loss.

HARVARD 6, CORNELL 5

Going into the first contest, the Harvard squad stepped off the bus energized and ready to finally play a full game against a conference opponent.

“Basically, our mentality was [that] we didn’t drive all this way to not put our best foot forward,” Bailey said. “Our energy was crazy.”

This energy remained even after the Big Red jumped out to an early 3-0 lead after three innings. The Crimson offense got rolling in the fourth frame when Kregel led off the inning by lacing a single to the third base side. The hitters behind him kept the line moving, and he would eventually score on a fielder’s choice off the bat of sophomore third baseman Mitch Klug.

“We just needed baserunners,” Martin said. “We put a couple together and [Cornell’s pitcher] lost command, so we kind of found our groove there.”

Despite a fourth inning home run from the Big Red’s Matt Hall, Harvard continued to narrow the deficit. In the next two innings, the team would tack on another four runs and take a one-run lead in the sixth courtesy of a single from senior second baseman Kyle Larrow which plated freshman shortstop Drew Reid.

Still, Cornell refused to go away quietly. In the bottom of the seventh, the Big Red’s Ryan Karl smashed a triple to right-center field, scoring teammate JD Whetsel and knotting the score at five. The game would remain tied through nine, and the teams entered extra innings.

After quickly hitting into two outs in the top of the 10th, the Crimson was running out of opportunities as Bailey came up to the plate.

“You don’t really want to keep going into 11, 12, 13 innings,” Bailey said. “You just try to get yourself on base and pass the torch to your teammates.”

Bailey came through by smacking an opposite field double, putting himself in scoring position and bringing Larrow to the plate. The second baseman also came through under pressure by singling to left field, allowing Bailey to race home from second to take the lead.

“We have a nickname for [Larrow],” Bailey said. “We call him ‘the servant.’ Whenever you need something, he’ll come through, and he did his job today.”

All that remained was for the Harvard pitching staff to seal the deal, and senior Zack Olson did just that. He recorded two strikeouts in the final frame and closed the door on Cornell to secure the 6-5 win for his team.