Box Score
JOHNSTOWN—After trailing 3-0, the Huskies shutout the Red Raiders for six innings, as the Bloomsburg University baseball team rallied to win, 5-3, over Shippensburg University in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Baseball Championship on Friday morning at Point Stadium.
With their starters depleted, the Huskies turned to Scott Runzer (Newtown/Council Rock North) to make the start on the mound. In only his second start of the year, Runzer held his own but yielded three runs through 2.2 innings. Eric Geedey (Elverson/Twin Valley) took to the hill in a tough third inning and stranded two after the Red Raiders took the early 3-0 lead.
In the fourth, the Huskies got on the board after hits by Jerry Lloyd (Mifflinburg/Mifflinburg) and Nick Eversole put runners on base. Jarrod Kramer (Orwigsburg/Blue Mountain) was hit by a pitch to load the bases, and a throwing error by Shippensburg allowed Brad Smith (Morgantown/Twin Valley) to reach first, while Lloyd and Eversole made it home.
Aaron Russell (Montoursville/Montoursville) added an RBI-hit in the third to tie the game at 3-3 through four.
The game remained tied through seven innings. Shippensburg loaded the bases with no outs. Geedey retired after 4.1 scoreless innings, leaving Matt Kline (Sugarloaf/Hazleton) to finish up the final two innings. In three pitches, Kline forced a line-out and double play to escape the trouble.
Bloomsburg finally took the lead in the bottom of the eighth. Joey Ianiero (Bloomsburg/Central Columbia)'s lead off hit and a single by Vince Smarrelli (Mt. Airy, MD/Urbana) put two on base, and Eversole drew another beanball to load the bases. Kramer earned the rare RBI-walk to score Ianiero's go-ahead run, and Smarrelli came home on a throwing error to add a pair to the Huskies' total, making it a 5-3 game.
Kline (1-4) notched two strikeouts and dismissed the Red Raiders in order in the ninth to secure his first win of the season and to keep the Huskies' championship hopes alive.
Coach Mike Collins was excited about his senior's performance as the closer. “We fed off his eighth-inning performance to take the lead in the bottom half. Matt slammed the door in the ninth,” Collins reported, describing Kline's day as “the best I've seen [him] throw.”
Shawn Patterson (3-2) threw 7.1 innings, yielding five runs (one earned) on seven hits with three strikeouts.
Bloomsburg (23-20) will now rematch IUP (21-27) in the semifinal round at 3:30 p.m. on Friday. If Bloomsburg wins, the teams would play again in an elimination game on Saturday for a spot in the championship game. An IUP win on Friday would knock out Bloomsburg and send the Crimson Hawks to the final.
