INCARNATE WORD 5, ABILENE CHRISTIAN 4
First Incarnate Word defeated number 10, then number seven, and now the Cardinals will play number three at the Division II South Central Regional championships.
In the first round UIW defeated Emporia State. Friday night Incarnate Word won 5-4 over Abilene Christian, the nation’s number seven squad. Next up is a 3:30 p.m. meeting on Saturday against host Central Missouri, the number three team in the entire nation. These two are the only teams remaining undefeated in the double-elimination affair in Warrensburg, Mo. Incarnate Word is 26th nationally.
Saturday’s winner goes to the championship game on Sunday while the loser must play a second game on Saturday against the winner of Abilene Christian and St. Mary’s coming out of the loser’s bracket.
Friday there were heroes aplenty for the Cardinals who won their school-record 42nd game against 16 losses.
In the bottom of the ninth, down 4-3, UIW loaded the bases with nobody out. Hector Flores singled to right field. Drew Hamilton singled to right also. Matt Hicks laid down a sacrifice bunt which was misplayed filling the sacks for Matt Flores.
Facing Abilene Christian’s top reliever, Brad Rutherford, who was a second team all-region pick, Matt Flores worked the count full before lacing a single just inside the third base bag which faded into the left field corner driving home the tying run in Hector Flores and the winning tally in Hamilton.
“I didn’t give him any signs,” Coach Danny Heep said of Matt Flores before that last at-bat. “You watch him hit and it looks ugly out there. He’ll hit 10 balls over the opposite field fence (just two in this deciding at-bat). One thing he does is battle. He is not scared of anything out there. He’s one of the guys who wants to make the play and drive in the run.”
The heroes list on offense also included Matt Roohan who was 3-4 for the second consecutive game. He drove home two of UIW’s five runs with a pair of doubles and a single. “He’s swinging the bat and that is picking up in the middle of our lineup,” Heep said about Roohan. Of the Cardinals’ 10 RBI in two games Roohan has six.
Elroy Urbina worked two perfect innings on the hill striking out four.
The Cardinals’ pitching staff came through again. Starter Memo Cienfuegas went five before Elroy Urbina came on for two hitless innings while striking out four. Alfredo Caballeros worked the final two innings picking up his sixth win against a single loss.
Abilene Christian (47-14) jumped out quickly. Really quickly. Aaron Oliver led off and hit the second pitch out of the park. Chris Hall followed with another second-pitch home run and it was 2-0 Wildcats before any of the fans could even sample their popcorn.
The Cardinals got those two back in the bottom of the frame when Hicks doubled leading off and rode home on a Steven Vidaurri single to left field. Roohan crushed a 380-foot, one-hopper to the wall in center-right-center field sending Vidaurri across the plate.
The pitchers settled in at that point and through the next seven innings the Wildcats had just four hits while UIW collected a mere three. One of the ACU safeties was a two-run blast by Bret Bochsler giving the Wildcats a 4-2 lead in the fifth. Then came the three-run rally over the final two innings and the Cardinals were advancing to Saturday undefeated.
ACU 2 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 -- 4 8 2
UIW 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 -- 5 9 1
Lambrix, Rutherford (8) and Tomkins. Cienfuegas, E. Urbina (6), Caballero (8) and Woodruff, Rodriguez (9). WP—Caballero (6-1). LP—Rutherford (3-3). HR—ACU, Oliver, Hall, Bochsler.