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In the end, the King’s College baseball team’s playoff run was wiped away by the weather.
Just like in the beginning.
A season that began late for King’s because of a snowstorm ended early when Saturday’s scheduled elimination game for the Monarchs was rained out, along with their hopes of continuing through the MAC Freedom Championship Playoffs.
A full day of rain Saturday forced a reformatting of the tournament, resulting in King’s being eliminated after just one game in the double-elimination event at Owls Field in West Lawn.
After dropping a 6-0 decision to second-seeded Misericordia in the league tournament opener Friday night, third-seeded King’s and fourth-seeded Manhattanville, an 8-4 loser to DeSales on Friday, were slated to play an elimination game at 11 a.m. Saturday. But steady rain throughout Friday evening and into Saturday morning, combined with a forecast that called for rain throughout the day and into the evening, proved to be the death blow for both King’s and Manhattanville.
With NCAA national tournament bids to be announced Monday morning, all conference tournaments are mandated to be completed by Sunday evening.
MAC rules state no team is permitted to play more than two tournament games on any one day of the conference playoffs. With the full three-game Freedom Conference slate for Saturday rained out, five possible games would have remained to be played before Sunday night’s NCAA deadline.
Ultimately, Middle Atlantic Conference executive director Ken Andrews was forced to invoke the conference playoff weather policy, which changed the event from a double-elimination event to single-elimination.
With that change, both King’s and Manhattanville were deemed eliminated. And top-seeded DeSales and second-seeded Misericordia both 1-0 after Friday’s opening round, will play for the Freedom Conference in a one-game championship game Sunday at a time to be determined.
Ironically, the start of the MAC Playoffs was pushed back a week from their originally-planned start, because Winter Storm Stella and its 20-some inches of snow in March delayed the opening of the MAC regular season by a week.
It was a stunning end to the season for King’s, which wrapped up the year with a 20-17 record while making a second straight conference tournament appearance and its ninth since the 2000 campaign. The Monarchs placed a program-record 10 players on the All-Freedom Conference squad.
In a Freedom Championships tournament opener Friday, Misericordia’s Tim Burek and two relievers combined on a three-hit shutout to lift the Cougars to a 6-0 win over King’s.
Burek struck out a career-high 10 batters over seven innings and Garret Pelko and Elliot Forde both tossed a perfect inning. Burek, the MAC Freedom Pitcher of the Year, picked up his ninth win of the season and the Cougars improved to 29-12.
Tyler Holzapfel led the Cougars with three hits while Steve Weisensee had two hits and two RBI and Jeremy DeCotiis had two hits and scored twice.
Tom Gibbons had two hits for King’s while Billy Neill absorbed the loss.
Misericordia will face DeSales for the title at noon Sunday at Owls Field in West Lawn.
Biasi works gem to even record
Former Hazleton Area standout Sal Biasi allowed just one run in seven innings Friday night and freshman Brett Davis enjoyed a career day at the plate as Penn State defeated Indiana, 5-2 at Bart Kaufman Field.
Penn State, which improved to 16-33 overall and 3-16 in the Big Ten, earned its second win of the week over a top-25 RPI team after defeating West Virginia, also on the road, Tuesday.
Biasi, who improved is pitching record to 5-5, kept the Hoosiers in check for seven innings, allowing just one run on four hits and three walks with six strikeouts. He stranded a pair of runners in scoring position in the second and ended the fifth with back-to-back strikeouts. Biasi was up to 110 pitches after six innings, but came back out for the seventh and retired the side in order with just eight pitches, striking out the final batter.
WOMEN’S TENNIS
The Wilkes University women’s tennis team saw its record-setting season come to a close with a 5-0 defeat to host Williams College in the second round of the NCAA Championship Tournament.
Wilkes’ season ends at 24-1, the most wins in a single season in program history. Williams advanced to the quarterfinal round, improving to 16-4 overall on the year.
Linda Shin then opened singles play for Williams with a 6-0, 6-1 at No. 5 before Hannah Atkinson bested Francesca Varela-Seri 6-0, 6-0 at No. 3 to clinch the second round win.
WOMEN’S LACROSSE
Misericordia 11, Arcadia 6
Lexee Willey scored three goals and the Cougars advanced to the ECAC Championship game at Stockton University.
Amy Roth added two goals and two assists in the victory, while Kaila Quinlivan had two goals, an assist, six draw controls and two ground balls. Kate Raab and Olivia Garcia both scored twice for Misericordia.
Misericordia improved to 14-4 and will face Marymount, a 9-8 winner over top-seeded Stockton, in the championship game Sunday at 2:00 at Stockton.