Isaac Collins delivered with his bat on Friday night (Spomer / WBR) CLICK TO BUY
With Seton Hall taking game one of their weekend series against Xavier, Creighton had an opportunity make up some ground in the standings if they could take care of business on their end beginning with Friday night’s doubleheader at Georgetown.
The Bluejays fell into a 3-1 hole after the first inning, but senior ace Mitch Ragan found his bearings and cruised through seven and a third innings to keep his team in the game and set the stage for junior second baseman Isaac Collins, who delivered a three-run triple with one out in the top of the ninth that he himself also scored thanks to a throwing error to crack open what was a tie game at the time.
“It was a slow start, but I give Mitch and the rest of our guys a lot of credit for hanging in there and allowing us to come back,” Creighton head coach Ed Servais said.
The Jays got the scoring started in game one when junior left fielder Will Robertson singled through the left side to score Jake Holton after the junior first baseman reached on a two-base throwing error with two outs in the top of the first inning. That lead didn’t last long, though, as the Hoyas touched up Ragan for four straight base hits with one out in the bottom half of the inning to hang a three-spot on the Creighton right-hander and take a two-run lead.
After the rocky first frame, Ragan reverted back to old reliable for the Bluejays and retired 18 of the final 22 batters he faced to keep the deficit at two. He finished his night having just allowed the three runs — one of which was unearned — on seven hits while striking out five and walking none over seven and 1/3 innings to lower his earned run average for the season from 4.11 to 3.95.
“I give Mitch all the credit in the world, because once we got through that inning he really settled in,” Servais said. “He got into his rhythm and kept us in the game. The first game of a doubleheader you don’t want to be pulling your starting pitcher early. He really, really stepped up.”
David Vilches had a strong game for the Jays (Spomer / WBR) CLICK TO BUY
While Creighton’s ace was in cruise control on the mound his battery mate was picking up the slack offensively. Sophomore catcher David Vilches entered Friday hitting just .190 on the season and had only scored five runs since the calendar flipped to April, but in game one he finished 1 for 2 at the plate with a double, two hit by pitches, and three runs scored. His first run cut Georgetown’s lead to 3-2 after he led off the top of the fifth inning with a double. The second run tied the game in the seventh after he was hit by a pitch, advanced to second on a balk, moved over to third on a sacrifice bunt, and came home on a wild pitch. The third and final run came as part of Collins’ clutch, bases-clearing triple off Georgetown closer Jacob Grzebinski that helped turn a 3-3 ballgame into a four-run cushion for Creighton.
“We were kind of lethargic and David had that big double to lead off the fifth inning that got us into the game,” Servais said. “Anytime you get three runs scored out of your eight-hole hitter you’re very, very pleased with that. We know we are going to get some production out of the top of the order. We just need to get some consistency out of the bottom and we did that game.”
Servais kept regular closer Bobby Kametas on ice for game one and let Omaha native John Sakowski finish the job. The reliable right-handed junior struck out four of the five batters he faced over the final inning and a third to seal the deal for his fourth win of the season.
Denson Hull has continued his remarkable in-season turnaround with a strong game in the suspended nightcap (Spomer / WBR) CLICK TO BUY
The second game of the day wasn’t nearly as dramatic as Creighton tuned up Georgetown starter Nick Morreale for nine runs — seven earned — over four innings to build a 9-0 lead before storms rolled in and halted play before the start of the sixth inning. Morreale came into the weekend with a 1.80 earned run average in Big East play and a 31:8 strikeout-to-walk ratio over 20 innings against conference opponents, but the Jays jumped all over him with crooked numbers in the first, second, and fourth innings. They scored a pair of runs off Morreale in the first on a two-out, two-run double by senior third baseman Jordan Hovey, then doubled the lead in the second inning with a solo home run by sophomore catcher Garrett Gilbert and a two-out RBI single by Jake Holton. The fifth inning was where the Jays really blew things open as Will Robertson started things off by smacking a three-run homer over the center field wall. Hovey and senior shortstop Jack Strunc capped off a five-run frame with consecutive RBI sacrifice flies to extend the lead to 9-0.
“He couldn’t throw his secondary pitches for strikes tonight,” Servais said when asked how his team had so much success against one of the top arms in the Big East. “He became a one-pitch guy and once we zeroed in on that we were able to drive the ball. Garrett Gilbert got us going when he drove the ball the opposite way and then Will hit the three-run home run. [Morreale] was throwing 94-95, but he just had trouble with his secondary stuff, and when you become a one-pitch pitcher our guys can exploit that pretty good.”
While Georgetown’s starter was struggling to keep the ball in the yard his counterpart was mowing down Hoyas left, right, and center. Senior left-hander Denson Hull continued his recent run of success with another strong start on Friday night. Before the game was suspended, Hull had allowed just one hit over five innings of work. He struck out five hitters, walked none, and faced just one over the minimum to lower his earned run average by nearly half a run.
“He was throwing a lot of strikes,” Servais said. “There is no trick to pitching, in my opinion. If you throw a lot of strikes you’re going to have a lot of success. He was getting his secondary stuff over tonight really, really well. He got a lot of swing and misses, and had very little hard contact. It’s too bad because he wanted to finish it off obviously, but we’re not going to be able to bring him back tomorrow. We’ll have to piece it together.”
By rule, Friday’s nightcap is already an official game as both teams batted in the fifth inning. Should game two resume, Servais said that junior right-hander Ben Dotzler will likely get the first crack at picking up where Hull left off if the Hoyas and Jays are able to find a window to finish the final four innings. Georgetown’s players have finals in the morning, so the earliest that game two will start back up is 3:00 p.m. (ET). The final game of the three-game series was already moved to Saturday night due to inclement weather in the forecast later that night and early in the morning on Sunday. Regardless of how things play out the rest of the weekend, Creighton’s skipper just wants his team to finish what they’ve started and not let up until it’s time to head back to Omaha.
“We want to keep the momentum in our dugout,” Servais said. “I don’t want [Georgetown] to start to feel good about themselves. We have a lot of momentum in our dugout right now and I want to keep it the way things ended tonight.”
