Trailblazer baseball falls on the road at D-I No. 8 Wabash Valley

1. CARMEL, Ill. – The Vincennes University baseball team faced their toughest test of this young 2023 spring season Tuesday afternoon after traveling to Mt. Carmel to take on NJCAA Division I No. 8-ranked Wabash Valley College.

The Trailblazers got off to another hot start Tuesday afternoon, with leadoff hitter sophomore Ethan Burdette (Linton, Ind.) reaching base on an infield single and advancing to second on a throwing error, one of three hits Burdette would have on the day.

Burdette was then followed by an RBI double by sophomore Kaden Elliott (New Albany, Ind.) to put the Blazers on the board first.

Wabash Valley would answer back in the bottom half of the first, sending all nine batters to the plate and scoring three runs to grab the lead back at 3-1 after 1.

The VU pitching would settle in as VU led off the top of the fourth with freshman Carter Whitehead (Huntingburg, Ind.) reaching on an error and later scoring on a sacrifice fly by Kaden Elliott, giving Elliott two RBIs on the day.

This would be as close as the Trailblazers would get however as the Warriors plated two runs in the fifth, two runs in the sixth and one run in the seventh to pull away late and grab the 8-2 victory over VU.

“Am I happy with today? Yes and no,” VU Head Baseball Coach Chris Barney said. “From the standpoint of competing, absolutely. But we’ve got to play better baseball. Offensively we had a couple of chances there to really break the game open early and really put some pressure on them and unfortunately they did a good job of working themselves out of a couple of jams.”

“This game here does make us feel good at the end of the day, but we’ve still got to play better baseball overall,” Barney added. “When we’ve got chances to win ball games we have to go out and win them.”

“Offensively it’s all a matter of stringing hits together when the game is on the line,” Barney said. “Kaden did a good job today with two RBIs but he also came up with the bases loaded and hit into a double play. So it was just one of those things where he could have had a really big game, instead he had a solid game. But when we get into those tight situations and it’s time to step up and be the man, we need someone to take that step.”

“But we picked up eight hits today off of some quality pitching, so hopefully today was just getting us ready for this weekend,” Barney added.

Freshman Josh McCormick (Indianapolis, Ind.) got the start on the mound for VU. McCormick would throw two innings, allowing three runs on four hits and striking out one.

Freshman Logan Medsker (Marshall, Ill.) was the first out of the pen and pitch two and one third innings, allowing two runs on four hits and striking out two.

Sophomore Caleb Moore (St. Louis, Mo.) was called on to get the final two outs of the fifth and did so in just five pitches. Moore would also get the first out of the sixth for a full inning of work, allowing two runs on one hit and striking out one.

Freshman Xavier Hart (Jeffersonville, Ind.) pitched one and two-thirds innings allowing one run on two hits and striking out two and freshman Holden Clifton (Louisville, Ill.) took over on the mound after playing at third base to pitch the eighth inning, allowing only one hit and throwing nine pitches.