Box Score

WINTER HAVEN, Fla. – Three Augustana hurlers combined on a three-hit effort and junior Nathan Gray (Rock Island HS, Rock Island, Ill.) hit the Vikings' first home run of the spring Monday, as Coach Greg Wallace's club moved to 2-0 with a 6-2 win over Capital at Chain of Lakes Park. Junior lefty Chris Sauer (Rock Canyon HS, Littleton, Colo.) went the first five innings and picked up the win. The Crusaders fell to 1-3 on the year.
 
Gray staked Sauer to a 1-0 lead with a one-out blast off Tyler Spears in the top of the first. Augustana stranded two runners in the second, but added a run in the third on Mitchel Ruh's (Hinckley-Big Rock HS, Big Rock, Ill.) double to the gap in left center and an RBI single to right off the bat of junior Trace Gingerich (Sherrard HS, Sherrard, Ill.).
 
Ruh's leadoff walk led to a Viking run in the top of the sixth. Junior Jeff Prior (Rock Canyon HS, Lone Tree, Colo.) ran for Ruh and eventually scored on a Capital error to give Augustana a 3-0 lead.
 
Sauer cruised through the first five innings, surrendering just one single and a pair of walks, but ran into trouble in the sixth. He walked the first two batters of the frame—Joe Swisher and Jack Foley—and pinch hitter Justin Ennis singled to left, scoring Swisher with the first Crusader run. Junior right-hander Darwin Townsend (Libertyville HS, Libertyville, Ill.) came on in relief and Logan Bastian delivered Foley with a sacrifice fly to Gray in center. That would be all the Crusaders would get though, as Townsend retired the next two batters, including an inning-ending strikeout of designated hitter Tyler Cetnarowski.
 
Danny Fifer's (Lincoln-Way West HS, New Lenox, Ill.) sacrifice fly scored junior Alex Fluehr (Loves Park HS, Harlem, Ill.) with an insurance run in the seventh and the Vikings added two more in the ninth. Junior John Swiderski (Geneva HS, Geneva, Ill.), who came on to catch after Ruh was pinch run for, came through with a two-out, two-run single scoring Gray and senior Brandon Jasper (Central HS, DeWitt, Iowa) to put Augustana up 6-2.
 
Townsend, who had retired the Crusaders quietly in the seventh and eighth, got in a jam in the bottom of the ninth. Matthew Carnahan led off with a single, the only hit off Townsend in 3 1/3 innings. One out later, Kirby Boehm was hit by a pitch and Tyler Gibbons walked to load the bases. Wallace turned to Cooper SantAmour (Moline HS, Moline, Ill.) out of the pen and the sophomore right-hander induced a game-ending 4-6-3 double-play grounder off the bat of Austin Underwood to earn his first save of the season.
 
Ruh and Gingerich each had two hits for Augustana. Gray scored twice and Swiderski knocked in a pair. Sauer gave up two hits and two runs, walked four and fanned four to go 1-0 on the year. Townsend struck out four and allowed just one hit and one walk in 3 1/3 innings.
 
The Vikings are back in action on Tuesday, February 24, facing Hanover at Chain of Lakes at 10:00 a.m.