Box score
OREM, UT—Utah Valley needed only a win for itself over NJIT or a loss by second-place Northern Colorado in order to clinch the first-ever Great West Conference regular season baseball championship. And the Wolverines left no doubt, with a decisive win on Sunday that both clinched the title and sent the Highlanders home without a win in the four-game weekend series.
Utah Valley (33-17 overall, 22-2 Great West) belted NJIT on Sunday, 23-2, marking the eighth time this season the Wolverines have scored at least 21 runs in a single game. They have scored at least 10 runs a whopping 23 times in their 50 total games.
The winners, who will visit Houston Baptist in a four-game series next weekend having already clinched the title, got started quickly on Sunday against the Highlanders, pushing three runs across the plate in the first inning. They had just one hit, but it was a two-run homer for star third baseman Jace Brinkerhoff, who would finish the game 3-for-4 with four runs scored and four batted in. The home run was the first of three in the game for UVU and the 11th of the season for Brinkerhoff.
The Wolverines added three-run innings in the third and fourth innings and then put up seven runs each in both the fifth and eighth innings against the NJIT bullpen.
Junior RHP Kyle Beecher (3-2) was the starter and winner for Utah Valley after going the first seven innings and shutting out the Highlanders on five hits. The first reliever, Brian Whatcott, allowed an unearned run in the eighth inning and Ryan Chadwick allowed a run on three hits in the ninth inning.
The losing pitcher for NJIT was the starter, Kyle Burdi (0-7), who allowed five earned runs (nine total) in 3.1 innings. Of the four NJIT relievers, the only one with a clean line was the fourth pitcher of the day, John Prestano, who worked one inning and did not allow a hit or a run. The five pitchers combined to allow 17 hits, 11 bases-on-balls, and one hit by pitch.
Six different Wolverines got at least two hits. In addition to the aforementioned Brinkerhoff, 1B Goose Kallunki was 3-for-5, while Jake Rickenbach, Kevin Arendse, Austin Heaps, and Derek Amicone all collected two hits apiece.
Rickenbach, Heaps, and Amicone all hit doubles. Billy Burgess tripled. And Brinkerhoff was joined in the home run parade by pinch hitter Kirk Doxey, his third, and by Arendse, his sixth. The homer by Arendse was a two-run blast as part of the seven-run fifth inning and Doxety's three-run homer was part of the seven-run eighth inning.
NJIT finished with nine hits and eight of them came from 6-7-8 in the batting order. Jeffrey Pizzi, who had a fine series at the plate, was 3-for-4 on Sunday and 7-fo-11 in the series, appearing in three of the four games. He now leads the team in batting average for the season at .328.
Sophomore John Bouck, making his first start of the series, was a personal season-best 3-for-4. The backup catcher pushed his season batting average above .300 to .306, with 11 hits in 36 at-bats.
Freshman Teddy Bickert, who has led the team in batting average most of the season, but who was hitless in the first three games of the UVU series, bounced back on Sunday with a 2-for-4 that included NJIT's only run batted in. Bickert, who, along with Matt Tomczyk, has started 49 of NJIT's 50 games, is batting .311, which is third on the team. His 55 hits top the Highlanders.
NJIT got its first run when Bouck led off the eighth inning with a single and then stole second for his first stolen base of the season. He later scored as the result of a throwing error on a ball in play.
The Highlanders added a run in the ninth inning when Pizzi hit a two-out single up the middle, took second base on defensive indifference and then scored on Bickert's fifth double of the season.
NJIT is slated to host North Dakota in a four-game Great West Conference series later this week at Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium in downtown Newark.
With most colleges, including NJIT, having finished classes and final exams for the semester, the series will take place on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, rather than the usual GWC format of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. The first game against North Dakota is scheduled for Thursday at noon.
The Highlanders, 11-39 overall and 7-16 in the Great West, are likely to finish either sixth or seventh in the eight-team regular season standings. At 7-16, they are tied with Texas-Pan American.
There remains a slim chance that NJIT and/or UTPA could catch and surpass North Dakota (11-13) for fifth place. NJIT would have to sweep all four of its upcoming games this week against the Fighting Sioux and Texas-Pan American could then pass North Dakota, as well, if UTPA sweeps New York Institute of Technology next weekend in Texas and the Highlanders sweep UND. If that happens, NJIT and UTPA would finish 11-16 and North Dakota would finish 11-17 in conference play.
The odd game is the result of a rainout when the Highlanders were scheduled to host Texas-Pan Am on Sunday, April 25. UTPA had airline tickets to return to Texas that afternoon, which precluded a makeup game. Remarkably, that was the only conference game that has not been played among the 96 scheduled to date.
