GRAND CHUTE, WIS. – Senior John Zilnicki’s (Riverhead) bases-loaded, two-out single drove in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth as Cortland rallied for a 9-8 victory over Wisconsin-Stevens Point in the opening round of the NCAA Div. III Baseball World Series.

The Red Dragons (37-8-1) will face Linfield College (Ore.) in the second round Saturday at 4:30 p.m. (CDT). Stevens Point plays UMass-Boston Saturday at 10 a.m. in the loser’s bracket. Linfield is coached by former New York Yankees third baseman Scott Brosius, a Linfield alumnus.

Cortland trailed 7-1 after three innings and was still behind 8-4 entering the bottom of the eighth. The Red Dragons scored three times in the eighth to draw within a run, then tallied two runs to win the game in the ninth.

Junior Michael Mahay (Whitesboro) earned the win in relief and is now 3-1. He entered with two outs in the sixth and pitched three and one-third scoreless innings. He gave up four hits and no walks and struck out one. Cortland starter Travis Ratliff (Levittown/Division Avenue) left after two innings due to a blister on his finger. He gave up three hits, four walks and five runs with two strikeouts. Adam Brown (Rochester/Greece Athena) pitched three and two-third innings in relief of Ratliff and allowed six hits and three runs, two earned.
 

Scott Williams, the fourth Stevens Point pitcher, took the loss after entering to start the ninth. Joel Delorit pitched the first seven innings, plus the first batter of the eighth. He allowed seven hits and five runs, four earned, walked three and struck out two.

The winning rally started with a leadoff single by Adam Dimino (Honeoye Falls/Honeoye Falls-Lima). A wild pickoff throw by the catcher allowed Dimino to go to second and Andersen Gardner (Fairport) grounded out to second to move Dimino to third. Steve Nickel (Lake Ronkonkoma) was intentionally walked after drawing three balls, and Jason Simone (Utica/Thomas R. Proctor) singled up the middle on a 3-0 count to drive in the tying run. Khyle Dimino (Brighton) walked to load the bases and, following a strikeout, Zilnicki hit a flare into right center that dropped between the second baseman and the right fielder for the game-winning hit to score pinch-runner Billy Ribeiro (Congers/Nyack). The at-bat was the first of the game for Zilnicki, who entered the game defensively in the top of the ninth.

Gardner and Adam Dimino each finished 2-for-4 with a walk and two runs scored. Gardner and Simone drove in two runs, as did Khyle Dimino, who went 1-for-3 with two walks.

Cortland scored three in the eighth with the benefit of five walks. Gardner led off with a walk and scored on a Nickel triple to cut the deficit to 8-5. Simone’s groundout plated Nickel and four straight walks to Khyle Dimino, Kris Gentzke (Clarence Center/Clarence), pinch hitter Kevin Jackson (Wappingers Falls/Roy C. Ketcham) and Damon Arnold (Wellsville) created the other run. The rally was cut short when Matt June (Colonie) lined into a double play to shortstop, with Gentzke doubled off at third, to end the inning with Cortland down 8-7.

Stevens Point scored in the first on a hit batter, two walks and a one-out sacrifice fly by Justin Jirschele. Cortland tied the game in the first on a Gardner RBI single, but the Pointers scored four runs with two outs in the second on a Travis Tuschen infield single, a Brad Archambeau double, an Eric Fritz walk, a Jeremy Richter RBI walk and Sam Spurney’s three-run double. The lead grew to 7-1 in the third on a Tuschen RBI groundout and an Archambeau RBI single.

Cortland got two runs back in the fourth. Adam Dimino walked and Gardner singled. Gardner took second when Dimino beat the throw from the outfield to third. Two outs later, Khyle Dimino singled to left to drive in two runs. The Red Dragons tacked on a run in the fifth on a Garnder RBI groundout. Stevens Point’s final run came in the top of the sixth on a two-out infield single by Tuschen.

Spurney finished with two hits and three RBI for the Pointers. Tuschen was 2-for-5 with two RBI, Archambeau was 2-for-5 with an RBI and Dan Douglas went 2-for-4.

“QUOTE”BOOK:

Cortland Head Coach Joe Brown:

“It was a tremendous baseball game. I give a tremendous amount of credit to Stevens Point for jumping out. Their pitcher was doing a good job. We had some stranded opportunities early.”

“It was a tough situation with our starting pitcher (Travis Ratliff) and the development of a blister and we had to take him out. I give a tremendous amount of credit to the young men (Adam Brown and Michael Mahay) who had to come in after him. They kept us in the baseball game.”

Cortland First Baseman John Zilnicki:

(about whether he felt pressure on his game-winning at-bat) “A little bit, but (Coach Brown) trains us all year to have pressure on us, whether it’s practice situations or the (game) schedule he puts us through in the beginning of the year. We’re used to these situations playing good teams like this.”

(on getting warmed up for his at-bat in the ninth, his first of the game) “Normally in New York it’s cold out , so it takes a long time to get loose, but here it’s 80 degrees, so it didn’t really matter. You’re in this game the entire time mentally, so it’s fine.”

Cortland Catcher Andersen Gardner:

“We never really got down. We knew that our offense has done it time in and time out all year long. We knew that we could get back into the game as long as we got good pitching from the pitchers who came in. That’s what we got. We battled our way back into the game and had good at-bats every inning. It was a good effort.”

NOTEBOOK:

* The win is Cortland head coach Joe Brown’s 399th career victory, all at Cortland. His record in 11 seasons is now 399-110-2.

* Jason Simone’s game-tying RBI single in the bottom of the ninth extended his hitting streak to 19 straight games.

* Khyle Dimino stole two bases in the game and has tied the school single-season record with 35 steals – a record originally set by Craig Kerner in 1999.

* Wisconsin-Stevens Point left 15 runners on base, four short of the NCAA tournament single-game record.

* Cortland third baseman Steve Nickel and left fielder Jason Simone were both named second team All-Americans by the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA). ..The awards were announced on Thursday evening at a pre-Series banquet in Appleton

* In addition, head coach Joe Brown was selected as the ABCA New York Region Coach of the Year for the sixth time…Brown’s previous awards came in 2000, 2001, 2005, 2007 and 2008 – all seasons in which Cortland advanced to the World Series during Brown’s 11 seasons as head coach. 

Photo Gallery from the game (by d3photography.com)

Box Score

World Series Web page

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